In cuisine, black connotes rare, elegant and extravagant: black truffles, Russian caviar, black chanterelles … and peanuts?
Canada is an unlikely place for peanut growing – most production takes place in the U.S. South and China. But in the mid-1970s, Nancy and Ernie Racz, tobacco growers in Vittoria in southwestern Ontario, started toying with the idea of switching to a healthier crop. In 1982, out went the tobacco and in came the Valencia peanut, and Kernal Peanuts' 100-acre plantation became Canada's largest peanut operation.
About seven years ago, there was a fluke. Workers on the shelling and sorting lines started spotting black-skinned peanuts and setting them aside. "The black ones were about one in 1,000," Ernie explains. "We saved them until we had enough to plant an experimental plot of about 20 or 30 seeds."
What started with just a handful of black peanuts has grown into a 40-acre, 75,000-pound-a-year crop. The blacks are lower-yield, delivering 1,500 pounds per acre to the 2,000 pounds of Valencia peanuts, and more finicky to grow. In 2006, the rainy summer killed all the black peanuts they had planted. But the Raczs had some saved for, well, a rainy day, and so were able to start all over again.
The rare peanut's allure lies in its jet-black, glossy skins. Inside, the nut is darker than other varieties, while the flavour is basically the same – to the layperson anyway. To the peanut connoisseur, Nancy, they taste "more buttery, nuttier, smoother." Ernie doesn't eat a lot of peanuts, so he just agrees with his wife on this. So will we.
$2.45/200g or $4.59/400g exclusively from www.kernalpeanuts.com (they'll ship anywhere in Canada) or at the farm's gift shop.
Special to The Globe and Mail