The Clever Way To Pit Cherries With A Paper Clip

Sweet fresh cherries are one of the best parts of summer. When they're in season, you'll find tables heaped with cherries in grocery stores, farmers' markets, and if you're lucky, roadside stands. 

There are more than 1,000 types of cherries grown in the United States, per the Montana State University Extension Service. The most common is the Bing cherry, which is dark red, round, and sweet with a slightly tart taste. Rainier cherries are more delicate, with a blush pink color and more muted taste. Then there are sour cherries, which are usually used in recipes and to make jam. The type of cherry you choose depends on how you want to eat it. But all cherries have an issue: the pit.

Cherries are stone fruits, technically called drupes, according to Food52. Their juicy, luscious flesh surrounds a hard pit, which contains a seed. And while you can eat cherries with the pit still in them by nibbling carefully around it, it's more fun to just pop the pitted cherries in your mouth. Plus, you'll need pitted cherries in recipes. So, where do paper clips come in?

There are many ways to pit cherries. You can use your fingers, which usually results in a mangled cherry. You can cut it in half and pry the pit out. There are all kinds of cherry pitting utensils and machines, ranging from a simple plunger attached to a plastic or metal ring to a machine that will pit dozens of cherries quickly. But one of the most efficient and accurate ways to pit cherries is with a paper clip, per Chowhound.

The paper clip has a built-in scoop, it's inexpensive, and you'll be sure you got every pit out of every cherry. Before you begin, it's wise to wear an old shirt or an apron, because pitting cherries is messy. Choose a paper clip that's about the same width as the indentation in the top of the cherry. Wash the paper clip with soap and water and dry it. (As long as you're at the sink, rinse your cherries, too.) 

Then, advises Stemilt, pull the outside wire of the paper clip away from its body. That will leave you with a rounded "scoop" and a little handle. Remove the cherry stem, position the scoop end of the paper clip where the stem was removed, and push it into the cherry. Rotate the paper clip inside the cherry, then pull the pit out. Voila — a perfectly pitted cherry.

Now that you have a bowl full of pitted cherries, what will you do with all of them? If it happens to be summertime, the best idea is to find a hammock underneath a tree and just start eating.

But if you've pitted more cherries than you can eat in one sitting, you can also freeze those pitted cherries for the winter, when they aren't in season. Frozen, thawed cherries aren't great to eat by themselves because the texture can be slightly mushy. But they're luscious in baked goods, such as tart cherry pie or tart cherry galettes.

For those recipes, remember that one pound of fresh cherries yields about two cups, according to Reference.com. If your recipe calls for canned cherries, you can substitute frozen and thawed ones. (A 15-ounce can of canned cherries in syrup contains about 1-½ cups, according to Oregon Fruit.)