Edible Parts of a Peanut?

Question

What are the edible parts of the whole peanut? If you want can you be even more specific and explain what a peanut is?

Answer 1

The entire peanut, including the shell, is edible. I often eat the shells with the peanuts.

Among other things, Wikipedia says this about what a peanut is:

"The peanut, or groundnut (Arachis hypogaea) is a species in the legume family Fabaceae native to South America. It is an annual herbaceous plant growing to 30 to 50 cm (1 to 1 1/2 feet) tall. The leaves are opposite, pinnate with four leaflets (two opposite pairs; no terminal leaflet), each leaflet 1 to 7 cm (1/3 to 2.75 inches) long and 1 to 3 cm (1/3 to 1 inch) broad. The flowers are a typical peaflower in shape, 2 to 4 cm (3/4 to one and a half inches) across, yellow with reddish veining. After pollination, the fruit develops into a legume 3 to 7 cm (1 to 2 inches) long containing 1 to 3 (rarely 4) seeds, which forces its way underground to mature. Although a nut in the culinary sense, in the botanical sense the fruit of the peanut is a woody, indehiscent legume or pod and not a nut."

Answer 2

All of the peanut that is INSIDE the shell is ok to eat. Sometimes there is like a really thin redish shell on the inside peanut and you can eat that too.

Answer 3

Actually peanuts contain dangerous enzyme blockers and slight levels of poison. For more info:

http://www.earth360.com/diet_paleodiet_balzer.html

Best not to eat any legumes for this reason.

Answer 4

you may eat the entire peanut but most people dont eat the shells

Answer 5

you theoretically can eat the entire thing....itd probably give you some wicked bowel distress, most people tend to just crack the shell and eat the part that's inside.