Machetes vs Green Coconuts

pict

pict

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Jan 7, 2003
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YouTube - Ten Green Coconuts

This video is based on a simple concept, machetes and green coconuts. Most people in the Northern Hemisphere think that coconut water comes neatly packaged in sterile boxes. Reality is somewhat harsher.

If the splitting of green coconuts with machetes makes you feel uneasy or you have some moral objection to the eating of green coconuts or the splitting of green coconuts with machetes then please look away. These green coconuts were raised for human consumption and splitting them wide open with sharp steel machetes is simply a daily reality of life in the tropics.

Please don’t search for any deeper meaning or allegory in this video. It is not a commentary on modern American liberalism. I promise that I was NOT thinking of Nancy Reid or Harry Pelosi when I made this video. It really is just a simple video about green coconuts, machetes, and the people who love them.

Machetes in order of appearance

#1. 14 inch Tramontina Bolo

#2. 14 inch Tramontina Bolo

#3. 16 inch Latin Pattern Tramontina

#4. 14 inch Tramontina Bolo

#5. 12 inch Ontario CT1

#6. Condor Puerto Rican Machete (I had just received this one as a gift)

#7. I put the Cold Steel Bushman in this video to give some form of comparison between a seven inch knife and a machete. The Job was finished with a 13 Inch SAICO.

#8. 13 Inch SAICO Heavy Machete (SAICO is a Brazilian brand)

#9. 20 Inch Chies Machete

#10. 14 inch Modified Tramontina Golok of my own design

The Giant Toad is commonly called a Sapo Boi or Bull Toad. This one lives in our yard and happened to show up while we were filming. Hes so ugly even the Pit Bull leaves him alone.

Mac
 
Looks like fun! I love that toad, I wish we had those around here. I bet he helps out by eating all of the local bugs he can find, which are probably similarly huge.
 
From what I understand that is the same kind of toad they introduced to Australia, they call them cane toads over there and they are a huge infestation now. Here they are very common in farm fields at night, and yes, they are very aggressive eaters. They actually get bigger than that one. Mac
 
Ok, so I'm already digging around, but I'm not seeing anything. Have you already posted about that sweet little modded tram golok?
 
pict said:
The Giant Toad is commonly called a Sapo Boi or Bull Toad. This one lives in our yard and happened to show up while we were filming. Hes so ugly even the Pit Bull leaves him alone.

Mac
Click to expand...

El Sapo!!!! ( I will post the funnier one once I get back to the main HQ)
20091025-Anders_Moller-1112-1060.jpg

-note: not same species
 
This is what it started as, a little too big for my tastes.

img3332mq5.jpg


img33697751083.jpg


The result is a very handy blade. I need to make a sheath for it now. Mac
 
Number 10 is my favorite. I suspect that little coring blade is pretty handy as well.
 
I was wondering where all the coconut milk was during cutting!
Are green coconuts different from "other" coconuts?
In Europe coconuts are brown, hard and there is a liquid and white coconutstuff inside the brown shell. I know these nuts also have a fibrous tough layer around them, and it looks hard to remove this layer from the brown nut itself.
I see why no liquid was spilled 4 minutes into the vid, but what happend to the brown nut inside and the fibrous layer. This was cut like butter? Is it because they are still green? What are the pro's and con's of eating "green" coconuts?
 
Joe,

I defer to your knowledge on the toad. I'm just going by the common names people call them here "Sapo-Boi" or "Sapo-Cururu", "Sapo" being Portuguese for Toad (or Frog for that matter). I can't tell the difference between the two and I don't think most people here who would tell you the name of the toad would be able to either.

The Wiki page in Portuguese says that the Sapo Cururu was the one exported to Australia. Mac
 
Jim malone said:
I was wondering where all the coconut milk was during cutting!
Are green coconuts different from "other" coconuts?
In Europe coconuts are brown, hard and there is a liquid and white coconutstuff inside the brown shell. I know these nuts also have a fibrous tough layer around them, and it looks hard to remove this layer from the brown nut itself.
I see why no liquid was spilled 4 minutes into the vid, but what happend to the brown nut inside and the fibrous layer. This was cut like butter? Is it because they are still green? What are the pro's and con's of eating "green" coconuts?
Click to expand...

Jim,

Lot's there. I think I need to do a primer on coconuts.

The coconuts start out with a tough green husk filled with water. As they grow the inner shell starts to form and gets coated with a thin, clear white jelly. A green coconut is harvested at this point for its water which is very mild and a fantastic thirst quencher.

If they are allowed to mature even further the meat of the coconut starts to form and become more of a white rubbery material and the water is still very mild. The inner shell will also be thicker and harder. I was splitting these to get at the white rubber meat, my kids like it.

If the coconut is allowed to fully mature the inner shell gets very hard, the meat matures into the hard "coconut" you are used to. Mature coconut water has a very strong taste and is very different from green coconut water. At this point the large exterior husk has turned brown and become looser. It is stripped away leaving only that hard inner shell, what everyone thinks of as a coconut outside the tropics. Here they are sold as "coco-seco" or dry coconuts.

Pros and cons?

The pro is that green coconut water is one of the best drinks available on planet earth, it really is awesome stuff on a hot day. I have heard that if you drink too much that it can be a laxative but I haven't experienced it yet. A typical green coconut, at least the ones around here, will have about 400-500 ml of water.

Mac
 
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Yep. Looks like a cane toad. Bufo marinus. Don't let your dog bite it. They have poisonous glands on their backs. They kill a lot of Australian wildlife that way. I have seen Kookaburras, tawny frogmouths and other species dead with a cane toad in their mouth. They killed the toad but didn't live long enough to swallow it.
 
OK... does anyone know where that tapping tool for the coconut water is sold. I've never seen those used in the West Indies. They just use a machete to open the coconut. Ans speaking of cocnut water, you wasted a whole bunch of it! That could have gone good with some rum. ;)
 
MDG said:
Yep. Looks like a cane toad. Bufo marinus. Don't let your dog bite it. They have poisonous glands on their backs. They kill a lot of Australian wildlife that way. I have seen Kookaburras, tawny frogmouths and other species dead with a cane toad in their mouth. They killed the toad but didn't live long enough to swallow it.
Click to expand...

"O Bufo marinus, conhecido como sapo-cururu, sapo-boi ou cururu,"

That's the one.

Mac
 
pict said:
Joe,

I defer to your knowledge on the toad. I'm just going by the common names people call them here "Sapo-Boi" or "Sapo-Cururu", "Sapo" being Portuguese for Toad (or Frog for that matter). I can't tell the difference between the two and I don't think most people here who would tell you the name of the toad would be able to either.

The Wiki page in Portuguese says that the Sapo Cururu was the one exported to Australia. Mac
Click to expand...

As far as I know (and that isn't much for South America), in the brazil region you have two B.A.T. (Big Ass Toads :P)
The Cane toad, and the Rococo Toad (more common). The Rococo has an extra set of poison glands on its hind legs. Yours might be the Rococo, but I will humbly state that I can't tell unless I hold the big hut in my hands. Cane toads come in all sorts of colors.

The large toad species are really tolerant of people. In Costa Rica they let them run around some of the darker restaurants to take care of the roaches. Here is a Cane Toad in a really nice restaurant we stopped at
DSC09151-1.jpg
 
Thanks Pict for the great explanation. The coconut seems to be a great survival tool. Drinkable water, food, and iirc the matured fibrous coconut husk is very usefull as fire kindle. If only they grew 3 feet above the ground!
 
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