How to Peel a Pomegranate in 5 Easy Steps?

Pomegranates are probably my favorite food. I could live on them. But, they have one major flaw. Peeling them.

They have this tough skin that gets hard as a rock if, God forbid, you leave them too long before getting around to peeling them. Try to peel that thing off without popping a bunch of the little packet of sweet, juicy flavor around the seeds. Thus, staining anything it touches. Good luck!

And, speaking of stains. The stains my fingers get from trying to peel these things drives me nuts. My fingers dry up and turns a pale, orangey color. Um, why?

I know I could get the seeds in a little container in the store, but that just seems so lazy and wrong.

And, I have heard several times that you just cut it in half and hit it with a wooden spoon. Then, all of the little seeds pop out like beautiful, red, magic rainfall. I’ve even seen Nigella do it on her show. I tried it, and I just ended up mashing the pomegranate and having little red dots all over my kitchen. It was a pomegranate massacre. Should have had a white chalk outline around it and called CSI. Not really the outcome I was looking for.

So, if you are not a pomegranate whisperer, like I am not, I am going to share with you my technique for getting those pesky, but oh-so-tasty seeds out with as little hassle as possible. And, hopefully, as little stains as possible. Either red or orange.

Step by Step

Step 1 – Don’t cut the pomegranate in half. Score it. Take a sharp knife and score the skin around like you would be cutting it in half, going around the top and bottom. (It’s easiest to go around the little nib at the bottom.)

Step 2 – Put the knife in the top to separate the top where the skin is thick

Step 3 – Gently pull apart to separate the two halves.

Step 4 – Score each half in half (so you have quarters) on the outer skin. And gently pull it apart.

Step 5 – Get a big bowl of water. Use it to help you get the seeds out. Just have your hands in the water with the pomegranate quarters. Bend them back a bit and gently scrape out the seeds with your fingers. (I know scrape isn’t a gentle word, but I couldn’t think of another one to mean the same motion. Just be gentle.)

The bowl of water is especially helpful if you have an older pomegranate that has tons of yummy seeds but a skin that might as well be made of titanium. The water helps to make the skin more pliable to work with, as well as preventing the weird stains the skin causes on your fingers. Not a fan of those stains, if you hadn’t guessed.

Then, after the seeds are out, just sift through them to make sure you get rid of the icky ones and keep the good ones.

Done!

Until later, here’s to…Living better, easily!^™

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