Ground Nuts. Peanuts, Earth Nuts. Arachis hypogaea.
Preparations: Oil of Arachis
Ground Nuts. Peanuts. Earth nuts. Goober-nuts.—The fruit of Arachis hypogaea L., a leguminous, annual plant, indigenous probably in Africa and South America and abundantly cultivated in our Southern States, China, etc. Recent government statistics show that about 16,000,000 bushels are produced annually in the United States, and about 29,000,000 bushels imported. There has, however, been a great increase in the domestic production in the last year or two, and the American crop will probably be much larger in the near future.
A remarkable property of the plant is that its fruit ripens under the surface of the ground, into which the pods penetrate after flowering, until the young fruit is completely buried under the soil in the progress of their growth. The kernels or seeds contain about 45 per cent. of a fixed oil. (See Oleum Arachis, Part I.)
