The Easiest Way to Peel a Melon
Melon is not my favorite melon, but melons I have eaten most. My grandmother served it at the end of every summer meal (with salt and pepper), and once I realized it was socially acceptable to wrap pieces of meat around sweet orange slices, by my 20s, I had developed the habit of melone prosciutto. (Actually, maybe I lied before. This is my favorite melon.)
Breaking one of these things is almost second nature to me, so I never thought about making a tutorial until one of the unnamed staff members explained their method of cutting melon through Slack. “I cut [it] into wedges, then cut out the seeds, then cut the rind, and then chop the fruit.”
This is discreet chaos, and the high key is much more difficult than it should be. But this is not the fault of the remote. Melon preparation is not intuitive. Unlike most fruits, the skins are removed last, which – just like leaving the root end of an onion – helps keep things clean and tidy as you cut and dice. If that doesn’t make any sense to you, don’t worry. I’ll show you how to do it. Let’s take a melon apart, step by step.
Step 1. Cut the melon in half.
Start by cutting the melon in half, starting at the end of the stem and slicing on the opposite side.
Step 2: scoop out the seeds
Remove seeds, fibrous debris and grease surrounding them with a shared spoon. Plant the seeds or throw them in the compost.
Step 3. Cut the melon into wedges.
Divide the halves into four pieces by cutting them vertically into two equal-sized wedges. Do it again and you have eighths. Do it again and you have sixteenth. I’ve never gone further than that, but you could, if you wanted, live by your own rules!
Step 4. Start making these segments
Take a paring knife (or a large knife, if you’re comfortable) and cut vertically down to the rind, but not through it. The size of these incisions is up to you. Play with it! Have fun!
Step 5: Finish him!
Take a paring knife and slide it under the melon flesh along the skin (and away from your body). That’s all. You now have neat little (almost) cubes of melon perfect for a snack (with a little salt) or a prosciutto wrap. I suppose you can also make a fruit salad, but I have never come across a fruit salad that comes close in taste to prosciutto with melone.