Observation on Design – Food Preparation
What: How to Slice an Orange
Prelude: One might think that oranges have been around long enough that slicing one into segments is a simple thing to do.
How to slice an orange… This is for my friends at Orient Garden every time they bring out that little dessert plate with fortune cookies and sliced oranges I wish they would look at the orange differently and slice it into simple clean segments. You can start with most any orange and a serrated knife. (#1)
Line it up so that the little belly button is to your right. Slice a little off each end. Attempt to cut enough to limit waste, while getting the rind. (#2) Then turn the orange and slice into it, from the top to the bottom through the center. 
Here you see that it helps to use a serrated knife. (#3) Draw slowly and only cut to the half way mark.
Citrus fruit comes in little segments that run from the top of the fruit to the bottom. When you see, for example, candy orange slices they all look like the little segments illustrated here The next step is to make the first slice start at a slight angle. Look at the end of the orange and guesstimate where a segment would be. Slice at an angle down towards the core of the orange so that you end up with one segment removed. (#4) Slightly smaller than a segment is good.
It eliminates the wall between segments. It also leaves the core with the balance of the orange.
The orange has an outer rind, a central core, segments, the segment walls and possibly it has seeds, although some varieties don’t. It is not unlike slicing an apple
You want to avoid creating a slice with part of the core or the wall between the segments.
The next slice is easy to do because you can see were the central core is. Start by slicing slightly out from the center to avoid the core and to avoid any seeds and cut another segment. Cutting could be from the core out or the rind in. (#5)
You can look at the end of the orange and get a sense for where the segments are. Use this as a guide to make your slices. Once you get through the first half of slicing you should end up with the core completely on the other half at this point it may be easy to lay the orange half flat on its back and slice past the core creating several more segments. (#6)
The point of this exercise and these illustrations is to create a sliced orange in an easy manner, that looks nice, as well as being simple and clean to eat. (#7) With no more waste that the alternate cross cut (seeds and all included).
So next time you’re serve some orange slices for dessert and they are simply sliced across the equator of the orange tell the server about Observation On Design.
What: How to cut an orange into slices
How: Serrated knife, angled cuts, eliminate the center core
Level: Simple
Thanks – Observation on Design – Thats how I did it!
Observation on DESIGN 