Product Review: Amco Avocado Pitter/Slicer

The Amco Houseworks Avocado Slicer/Pitter sounds like a cool deal. It claims it will easily remove the pit and slice the fruit. Their website says, "Emergency medical professionals are cheering about a new product innovation...[c]uts from knife slippage...are one of the most common kitchen emergency hazards."

I eat avocados whenever possible (read when the price is reasonable). In the past, I used a spoon to remove the pit and the fruit. Removing the pit caused me to squeeze the fruit, which was not good. If you know me, you know that I don't get along with sharp objects. Then I learned how the professionals do it. Not me, I said. Holding something in my hand and whacking it with a knife isn't wise, especially if I want to keep the blood in my veins. Holding the fruit on the cutting surface doesn't work too well either when I'm trying to keep my fingers out of the way.

The Amco Avocado Slicer/Pitter works very well. It takes a little practice to get it to work smoothly and not take any meat with the pit, then following through with the slicing end. The photo to the left is a fair representation of what you get, even the first time you use it. It retails for about $11.

Clean-up is a snap. All you have to do is swish it in soapy water and rinse.

Focus Products Group, LLC, parent company of Amco, also makes an Avocado Skinner. This item looks suspiciously like my grapefruit knife. The MSRP for this is $10. I don't remember how much I paid for my grapefruit knife, but in my research I found the one I have sells for about $24. If you don't already have one, I'd by the Avocado Skinner, which could probably double as a grapefruit knife. If you already have a grapefruit knife, save your ten bucks, and use it to skin avocados too. If you don't have either product and neatness or esthetics is not important, use a spoon.

If esthetics is important, deciding which product you buy depends on how you serve your avocado. If you normally serve slices or dice the fruit, you only need the slicer/pitter. If you want larger pieces, you would want both. The pitter is worth the price of the product even if you seldom, if ever, use the slicer end.