Our House Smells Like Peanuts!

I am one of those people that loves the markers of seasons. By that I mean, I love all the things that happen every year at the same time. For example, I love that the Bradford pears are one of the first trees to bloom each March, marking the beginning of Spring and I love that we get to pick strawberries every April marking summer's approach.

We are experiencing one of those season markers right now. Our house smells like peanuts, because we boiled a big pot of them last night. Before moving to SE Alabama, I didn't know a whole lot about peanuts, but I have learned a lot since. Did you know that peanuts grow underground? At harvest time, a machine digs the plants up and turns them over in the field. After 2 or 3 days of drying in the field, a harvesting machine separates the peanuts from the plants and loads them in "wagons" that are hitched to trucks.
We are definately in peanut farming country here, so peanuts seem to effect many parts of our life. Our house is located just 1/2 mile from the peanut coop. Every fall, harvested peanuts are brought in the peanut "wagons"to the coop and attached to "blowers" for curing. Hot air is forced slowly through the wagons during this process. This makes a loud, but low (in pitch) humming type noise. There are many of these running at the same time, so we hear them day and night during peanut season. I have fond memories associated with the sound of the blowers, because my son was born during our first peanut season here. When I would be up to feed him at night, I would hear the almost hypnotic, comforting sounds of the peanut blowers down the road. Every fall, the event of the season is the Peanut Festival. This rivals most county fairs, is attended by just about everyone and climaxes with the Peanut Festival Parade through downtown.
Anyway, all that to say our neighbor gave us fresh peanuts yesterday and we took on the task of pretending to be natives: We boiled them! Boiled peanuts are a favorite snack of this region and we are in full agreement! We have enjoyed the taste of them every fall since we have moved here. But this time, we boiled them ourselves. It was fun and they were tasty. Now, our house smells like peanuts marking the beginning of Fall. It may still be terribly hot and humid and so far no leaves have changed colors, but we know Fall is on its way, because the peanut harvest is beginning.

Click on over to my recipe blog to learn how to boil peanuts.

The photos in this post were taken by Old Shoe Woman and shared on Flickr.

Goddess of Eats

I have this friend. She's owns a catering business and makes the most beautiful cakes. She has a blog, Andrea Howard Blog (You can read more about our relationship here).

She recently asked me to guest post occasionally on her blog. I am thrilled to do this for many reasons, but the main one is that daily posting on my own blog has become too big of a job for me. So, an occasional deadline for her blog motivates me to get to typing (and taking pictures) without overwhelming me.

Today is my first post, and it is about boiled peanuts. Boiled peanuts are a loved snack in our region of the United States and one that I am glad to have discovered. I wrote about it on Sweet Tea Please back in 2007 (check it out here), but my new post on Goddess of Eats goes into more detail and includes a new recipe. So, please head on over to Goddess of Eats and read my guest post. While you are there, you MUST look at all her luscious recipes.

A Series: Fall in Lower Alabama!

* the smell of sawdust and cow manure
* ferris wheels and tilt-a-whirls
* youth in helmets wrestling heifers


* dusty roads and parking lots
* ranchers betting on the weight of that large Brahma bull
* children begging for more tickets to use in the Midway
* loud music blaring from speakers
* lots of camoflage and cowboy boots
* the smell of funnel cakes and kettle corn
* monkeys dressed in clothes, elephant rides and camels
* photography exhibits and vendor give-aways
* pigs greased in peanut oil
* pageant queens
* barrels of free peanuts to eat!

These are the sights, sounds and smells of the National Peanut Festival on farmer's night.