A Love Affair

I am in love with avocados! So much so, in fact, that the paint colour in our rec room is 'Guacamole'! Well we didn't do that on purpose. I'm also in love with green and the shade we wanted just so happened to be that - a match made in heaven!

Yes avocados are high in fat, but it's good fat - monounsaturated. They have also been shown to decrease both LDL (bad cholesterol) and triglyceride levels by 22% and raise HDL levels (good cholesterol) by 11%. Avocados have 60% more potassium than bananas, are rich in B vitamins, as well as vitamin E and K and they have the highest fibre content of any fruit. I could go on forever about the health benefits of this gem, but I have to finish painting my bedroom...not guacamole, though it is green.

If you're not that familiar with avocados, when you're buying them, Haas avocados are most readily available in grocery stores. A ripe avocado is relatively firm, but will yield to gentle pressure when you give it a slight squeeze. Color cannot always be trusted to determine whether or not an avocado is ripe. The squeeze test is the way to go. If you plan to use the avocados right away, then buy the ripe ones. But if you want to buy them a few days before you plan to use them, get them when they are hard and do not yield to squeezing. Then just leave them out on the counter and wait for them to get ripe.

So how do you you cut the avocado? There's not really any wrong way to do it, but there a couple of quicker, easier ways to do it: Grip the avocado gently on one side with one hand. With a large, sharp knife in the other hand, cut the avocado lengthwise around the seed. Open the two halves to expose the pit.

Now, there are a few ways you can proceed to remove the pit from the avocado half that has the pit. One way is to make another cut, lengthwise on the avocado half that has the pit, cutting around the pit, exposing it so that it is easier to remove. You can also use a spoon to scoop out the pit.

Another way to do it is a bit trickier and if you're a bit nervous, fold up a kitchen towel and use that to hold the avocado half with the pit. Gently tap the pit with a knife with enough force so that the knife edge wedges into the pit, but not so hard that you cut all the way through it. Tap it very gently a few times, with increasing pressure each time, until a cut is made in the pit sufficiently to twist the pit out. Getting the pressure just right takes a little practice. With the edge of the knife, twist the pit out of the avocado and discard. Then just tap the handle of the knife on the edge of the sink once or twice and the pit will come off the knife.

Then you can either scoop out the flesh with a spoon or you can cut the chunks into the flesh while still in the peel, then scoop out with a spoon.

I love to put avocado on sandwhiches, in salad, burgers and my most favorite of all...Guacamole!! This is one of my signature dishes. Now I usually just throw all the ingredients together and go by taste, but I've put it into a recipe to share with you. Enjoy!

Tara's Guacamole

5 avocados, cut into small chunks
1/2 medium red onion, diced
2 medium tomatoes, seeded and diced
1 cup cilantro, chopped

1-2 tsp lime juice

salt & pepper to taste

Chop the avocado and put into a bowl. Sprinkle with 1 tsp of the lime juice to prevent it from going brown. Chop the onion, tomato and cilantro and add to the bowl. Combine until mixed, but still chunky. Add salt and pepper to taste and remainder of the lime juice, if needed. Chill. Serve.