PEANUTS
We think of peanuts as nuts, and for all culinary,
research and nutritional purposes they are. But they aren’t a typical
“nut” – botanically a fruit whose ovary becomes hard at maturity. This
is because along with peas, beans and lentils, they belong to the legume
family, whose members produce those familiar pods typically with one to
twelve seeds and whose root nodules are home to the helpful
nitrogen-fixing Rhizobium bacteria.
Peanuts
(also called groundnuts) are the seeds of Arachis hypogaea and
originally came from South America. The earliest evidence of people
tucking into them as a food crop (along with squash, beans, quinoa and
coca) comes from Nanchoc Valley in northern Peru where macro and
micro-fossils (from the calculus of human teeth) suggest they were part
of the local diet between at least 9500 and 7000 BP. They arrived in
Europe with the conquering Spaniards at the end of the fifteenth century
and then speedily made their way around the world to Asia, Africa and
North America.
Dr George Washington Carver is
considered by many to be the father of the peanut industry in the US. He
began his peanut research in 1903. He suggested to farmers that they
rotate their cotton plants (which deplete the nitrogen in the soil) and
cultivate peanuts which puts it back.
With their
protein, fibre, unsaturated fats, vitamins, minerals, trace elements and
phytochemicals, these popular nibbles pack a nutritional punch. They
are also rich in substances considered protective for the heart: an
amino acid (building block of protein) called arginine; vitamin E,
folate, copper (a mineral) and plant sterols.
What
about aflatoxin? Processed peanuts are quality-controlled for the
presence of fungus that produces a toxin called aflatoxin. Because
peanuts in the shell are not screened, throw away any mouldy ones.
What
about peanut allergy? This is an increasingly common food allergy
especially in children. One-third of all peanut-allergic people are also
allergic to tree nuts such as brazil nuts, hazelnuts, walnuts, almonds,
macadamia nuts, pistachios, pecans, pine nuts and cashews. See Read
More for fact sheet sheet.
Source: USDA
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