How to Cut a Cucumber

Cucumbers are one of the oldest cultivated vegetables, and one of my personal favorites. Peeled, cut, and served with a little salt, they are simultaneously savory and refreshing. They're fantastic marinated overnight in a bit of soy sauce, sesame oil, and chile flakes; the salt in the soy sauce draws out some of their liquid, so they get a super-concentrated flavor. As a stir-fry ingredient, they are one of the most underutilized.

Oddly enough, cucumbers are one of the two foods my wife can't stand, so chicken stir-fried with cucumbers, fermented bean paste, and Sichuan peppercorns is one of my quick, easy, and delicious go-to staples when she's out.

While you can certainly just slice the cukes whole onto salads, peeling and seeding them can help you make the most of their flavor and texture. This guide and video will show you how.

Shopping and Storage

In the supermarket, you'll usually find three or four kinds of cucumber:

• American or "garden" cucumbers are dense-fleshed and flavorful. They have thicker skins than most other cucumbers, which I recommend removing before eating. In any case, definitely give them a good scrub under cool running water to remove some of the food-grade wax that they usually come coated in. They also have lots of watery seeds that are sometimes good to scrape or cut out before use.
• English cucumbers usually come individually shrink-wrapped, which means that there's no need to scrub them before eating (they are not waxed). The skins are thinner than that of American cucumbers, so they can be consumed, no problem. Although they are usually relatively seedless, they're also much more watery than their American counterparts. They're more convenient to prepare, but less flavorful.
• Kirby cucumbers are like small versions of American cucumbers. Thick-skinned and relatively seedless, they have the strongest flavor of all, and a texture that can sometimes border on tough. These cucumbers are best prepared pickled.
• Persian cucumbers are increasingly common in American markets. They are similar in appearance to English cucumbers, except are often sold in much smaller sizes, often even smaller than a kirby.

How to Prep Cucumbers

There are many ways to slice, dice, cut, and otherwise prep cucumbers. Here are some of the most common methods.

How to Peel Cucumbers

Peeling is a good option if you want to remove the sometimes-thick skin, especially if it's too bitter. You can also half-peel a cucumber to split the difference, pulling strips of the skin off with alternating skin-on sections in-between. This can be a nice way to get some of the skin's bitter flavor and more substantial texture without it overwhelming every bite.

How to Slice Cucumbers

For perfect rounds, simply leave the cucumber whole and cut wheels into whatever thickness you want. Half- and quarter-moons are just as easily obtained by first (you guessed it!) halving or quartering the cuke.

To make crescent-shaped slices, halve the cucumber first, then scrape out the seeds with a spoon. Slice the seeded cucumber halves will now produce seedless crescents.

How to Cut Cucumber Sticks/Batons for Snacking and Dipping

A favorite form for hungry kiddos (or adults) and also for crudités platters and other dipping setups, sticks (or batons) are the name of the game.

Cutting cucumbers into sticks can be as simple as halving the cuke and then slicing it lengthwise into sticks with the seeds attached.

If you want seedless sticks that are more perfect baton shapes, quarter the cucumber lengthwise first, then use the knife to cut out the seeds at an angle. You can now cut the remaining section into sticks.

How to Dice a Cucumber

It's best to remove seeds for diced cucumber, otherwise some portion of your dice will just be squishy seed bits. To do this, start by making the seedless batons described in the section above. Then cross-cut the batons into dice.

For finer dice, start with a quartered-lengthwise cucumber, cut out the seeds, but then slice the plank of cucumber through the middle into thinner planks (this is best done with the cucumber section flat on the cutting board and your non-knife hand flat on top of it with its finger raised to avoid getting in the way of the blade). Then cut the planks lengthwise into thinner sticks, and cross-cut those into small dice.