OXO's 3-in-1 avocado tool opens, pits, and slices avocados effortlessly - it's the one single-use gadget I'll allow in my kitchen

Amazon

OXO Good Grips 3-in-1 avocado slicer.

• Avocados are delicious, but they can be challenging to open, pit, and slice without injuring yourself.
• Instead of whacking on the pit with a knife and nearly slicing your hand open, you can use OXO's 3-in-1 Avocado Slicer ($9.99).
• It has three parts: a plastic blade to cut into the avocado's skin, a pitter to remove the pit inside, and a slicer to evenly slice up the inside of the avocado.
• I use this handy tool every time I make guacamole - which is to say, often - and it makes the entire process much easier.

Like any self-respecting millennial, I love avocados. I eat them a couple times a week, and I plan my meals around their whims. If my avocado is ripe, I'm eating tacos that night. You can't exactly tell a ripe avocado "no" - they tend to rebel and turn stringy and brown when you ignore them.

The only thing I dislike about avocados is opening and pitting them. Without a proper tool, you're stuck using a knife to cut through the skin and take the pit out, which is, frankly, dangerous. I used to make my boyfriend take the pit out every time because I was convinced the knife was going to slip and cut my hand instead of removing the pit.

Luckily, I stumbled upon OXO's 3-in-1 Avocado Slicer at Bed Bath & Beyond one day about eight years ago. Even though I typically laugh at all the weird kitchen tools that have one very specific function and do nothing else (here's looking at you, strawberry hullers), I bought it. And I've been using it to turn avocados into guacamole for years now.

The design is simply ingenious. Every other avocado slicer I've seen doesn't do what I actually need it to do: open and pit the avocado. Just about anyone can slice the interior of an avocado up into neat pieces, but cutting into that tough skin and removing the hard pit with a sharp kitchen knife is difficult and filled with peril. OXO's slicer can take care of every step without putting your hands in harm's way.

At one end, the tool has a plastic blade that's just sharp enough to cut into the avocado's skin, but not sharp enough to cut yours. Then there's the avocado slicer part at the other end that you can use to cut the avocado's flesh into perfect pieces. But the best part is the pitter in the middle.

The pitter is perfectly round with three metal prongs in it. When you whack it on the avocado's pit, the metal prongs dig in and pull the pit out effortlessly - no scary knife skills necessary. The tool also has a grippy, rubbery exterior that's easy to hold and does not slip out of your hands.

With this tool, making guacamole is absurdly easy: I can open, pit, slice, and smash the avocado safely and easily in a few minutes before adding in tomato, onion, olive oil, and seasoning.

Whenever we have dinner guests over and they see me using OXO's Avocado Slicer, they inevitably ask me where I got it and end up with one of their own. After all, it only costs $9.99, so it's not a huge investment, and if you eat avocados as much as my friends and I clearly do, it's worth every penny.

Get OXO's 3-in-1 Avocado Slicer for $9.99 at Amazon and Bed Bath & Beyond

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