How to pit a cherry

Ever had a whole bunch of cherries just waiting to to be pitted and baked in a delicious crumble, pie, or danish but you didn't have one of those fancy cherry pitters that does all the hard work for you? Well, welcome to my world. I was given a bag of juicy cherries a couple of weeks ago and I decided I wanted to make a cherry pie from scratch. Well, the cherries sat there for awhile, simply because I kept meaning to buy one of those fancy cherry pitters, but kept forgetting to buy it. So the day finall came and I was ready to make the pie, but I had still not bought the silly contraption that was supposed to make my life so much easier. So, my friend Lisa told me I could use a straw. What? A straw? That sounds so easy, and it was. Here is how you pit a cherry:

First, start with a bowl of freshly washed cherries. Don't they look beautiful?

Next, remove the stems from all of the cherries. If you have a bored 4 year old running around like I did, put him or her to work. It makes a great assembly line!

See where the stem was before? That's where you're going to shove the straw through.

Now grab your straw. I had some disposable straws, but they were too flimsy, so I had to use one of my kiddos twisty straws. If you want to keep the straw, I don't recommend using that one, because I wasn't able to get the cherry bits out of the inside, but my kids are none the wiser. Now you're going to push the straw through where the stem was until you feel the pit and then push it through some more and the pit will pop out of the bottom. Sometimes it will fly across the kitchen and leave a trail of red cherry juice in it's path, so be prepared for that. You may also have to push a little hard, but it will come out, don't worry. Also be prepared for a mess. Cherries make a mess!  

Now you have a perfectly pitted cherry, ready to be eaten right then or baked with. I chose the latter, my 4 year old chose to eat his right away. Mmmm...oh the possibilities with this delicious cherry!

Stay tuned for tomorrow's Sweet Treat Tuesday, I will be sharing my cherry pie recipe!