The Gift Exchange

If you enjoy eating pistachios as much as I do or are about to order one of our gourmet gift baskets that contains pistachios, you may find the following tidbits interesting:

-Pistachios are not nuts! It’s true, I swear. What we eat and refer to as “pistachio nuts” are actually the seeds of a fruit. The outer fruit is removed during processing. The remaining pistachio fruit looks similar to a nut and is considered part of the cashew family, so most people refer to pistachios as nuts.

-Pistachios are joyful. In China, they are referred to as “happy nuts” while in Iran they are called “smiling nuts” due to the curvature of the open shell. In many of the Middle Eastern countries, if you hear pistachio shells opening on a tree while you are resting beneath it, it is considered good luck.

-California grows 98% of pistachios purchased in America and is the second largest pistachio producer in the world. Who is first? Iran. So from now on, when you think of Iran, think pistachios.

-Pistachios are the food of royalty. Queen Sheba pronounced pistachios as the exclusive food of the royal household and forbade commoners from growing them. Nebuchadenezzar, the ancient king of Babylon, planted pistachio trees in his famous hanging gardens. Akbar the Great held royal feasts with chicken that had been fed pistachios for the last 8 weeks to enhance their flavor.

Are you feeling hungry for pistachios all of the sudden? If so, type in “pistachio” into our search window and you’ll see which gift baskets feature this delicious “nut.” One of my favorites is the 22 oz. Microbrew Trio & Grilling Gift Set. The pistachios are great to munch on while grilling and taste extra good during the summer months.

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.