Guacamole

I'm constantly fiddling with guacamole. I change the recipe a lot. It is one of those simple things that can be tweaked to death or plain-jane. Mostly all are good (as long as you don't use a favor packet... please don't). I like mine to actually have some spice. Avocado kills spiciness. You need to add much more than you would to a salsa to get it to come through at all.

Before you start you'll need to know how to pick a ripe avocado. First look for color, a bright green fruit is not ripe. Look for a darker green almost black fruit. Then test with your hands. You should be able to gently press your thumb into the fruit without much resistance, ie. it should give when you apply pressure. The more the give the riper it is, until it's mushy- which you don't want. The little stem knot at the end should also easily fall off when it's ripe. More info (and a chart!) can be found here.

A Serrano pepper sliced down the middle to be de-seeded. If you touch a pepper, your hands will be spicy. Even if you wash them with soap and hot water, they will hurt your eyes, nose, skin etc. when touched. Capsaicin is hydrophobic (oily). You can wear disposable gloves while you make this, I find them handy in the kitchen. OR, after handling peppers you can wash your hands (SCRUB your finger tips and nails) with rubbing alcohol. Then wash them with dish soap. This cuts the capsaicin very effectively! I wear contacts so there can't be a trace of spice on my fingers!

What I consider finely chopped.

Here you can see the knife technique for easily removing the avocado pit.

All folded together with the pits added back and ready to eat! Don't worry about chilling this, eat it as soon as possible! The texture is actually better room temp.