Freezing the whole coconut makes the shell pop away from the flesh as soon as you crack it open. After freezing the coconut overnight, whack the fruit around its equator with the dull side of a cleaver and then peel the shell off of the meat. An additional benefit: The coconut water inside will be frozen, making it easy to remove without any spillage or waste.

Kitchen Hacks
To celebrate the publication of our latest book, Kitchen Hacks: How Clever Cooks Get Things Done, we're giving you a sneak peek at a few of our favorite kitchen quick tips. The book is packed with more than 1,000 solutions to tricky kitchen challenges, including these helpful holiday hacks.
Kitchen Hacks
Kitchen Hacks: How Clever Cooks Get Things Done - Get 1,000+ ingenious kitchen hacks from 20+ years of Cook’s Illustrated magazine.
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Triple Coconut Macaroons
Most coconut macaroons are achingly sweet, sticky mounds of semicooked dough that don't taste much like coconut. To solve these problems, we used three kinds of coconut.
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Traditional meat cleavers are built like medieval weapons. Could we find one fit for modern life?
Read Our ReviewUnsweetened Shredded Coconut
Until recently, you’d be lucky to find one brand of shredded coconut in the supermarket, but now there are lots of options—does it matter which one you choose?
Read Our ReviewThe Best Coconut Milk
We were shocked by the dramatic differences among canned coconut milks.
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