My Pistachio Stash
Back in college my roommates and I would regularly buy a bag of peanuts the size of a toddler. We’d prop it up against the coffee table and get to cracking. A small trash can was held between our feet, ostensibly to catch falling shells.
This set up wasn’t perfect. Wayward shell remnants reached the floor with regularity. Being college kids, we didn’t particularly care our living room floor developed the ambiance of country western bar.
Indeed, as our parents would ghastly attest to, peanut shells on the floor wasn’t cleanliness issue #1 at our higher education residence. I believe they’d cite something about a “blackened bathtub”.
Now that I have a wife, the bathtub is regularly scrubbed and peanut shells crunching underfoot is frowned upon. But I’ve found a great way to keep the cracking and snacking going from the comfort of my couch. Enter the Pistachio.
Pistachio’s harder shell doesn’t crunch as easily as the peanut, making managing fragments much easier. Plus a dropped shell won’t lose its integrity beneath my foot.
As a bonus, pistachios are healthier than peanuts. They’re packed with Vitamins B1 & B6 and carry more heart healthy fats. Like other nuts, they do pack a caloric punch. On heaping handful carries about 230 calories. But those fiber rich calories fill you up making pistachios a great snack.
There’s also something called the “Pistachio Principle”. Apparently all that cracking makes us eat less. It also applies to peanuts. Weird, in college four guys would polish a large bag in no time. Perhaps there were other factors at play.
