I spent a summer, when I was 10 years old, on a peanut farm. I distinctly remember when they made boiled peanuts from them, since it was a way we could cook them to eat some of our crop, without having to go through the bigger process of having them roasted.

I once had another southern friend, many years later, compare them to edamame when we described that to him. He said edamame was "the yuppie version of boiled peanuts".

Interesting to see them posted in a recipe :-)

I'm waiting for my cousin in Atlanta to send me some, I think he forgot and soon there won't be any left, and I will be really p***ed!! I would make some myself if I had a clue where to buy raw peanuts.

If you don't want to cook for hours, put peanuts in a pressure cooker, add salt and enough water to cover the peanuts, and cook at 15 pounds for 5 to 10 minutes. The shortest time is for peanuts straight out of my father's garden. The longest for ones that have been setting around in a grocery store. You can always test once the pressure has come down, and decide if you need a little longer.

Great suggestion, thank you Karen! ~Elise

I grew up eating boiled peanuts. I now live in the midwest and people look at me like I am crazy when I mention them. The good thing is we do have peanut farms in my state and I have make boiled peanuts for friends and they love them!!...

Thanks for sharing with the rest of the world.

I love southern boiled peanuts! I have also had boiled peanuts in a Chinese Dim Sum restaurant where they were flavored with soy sauce and asian seasonings. Very tasty, and interesting to eat with chopsticks :)

My favorite boiled peanuts are the ones you add sugar or honey to the water, gives the nuts a sweet edge with the salt that is wonderful. Give it a try.

Even if you don't like roasted peanuts, southern boiled peanuts are worth a try. Down here nothing is lightly salted or seasoned. The peanut is transformed into a carrier for the flavoring and you can feel your blood pressure rise even before you eat them.

I like my boiled peanuts on the al dente side. To get the right amount of saltiness for the shorter cooking time, I find you have to use more salt than you could possibly think necessary. I almost feel like I'm getting close to the saturation point before there is enough salt.

Also, if you want the peanut to soak up the salt but not get too mushy just turn off the heat and let them sit in the salty water for a few hours after boiling. If you don't allow for proper salt absorbtion you end up with only the shell and juice having any salt flavor. I'm not a huge fan of salt so I don't drink the juice, but the peanut is just not right without tasting salty through and through.

Oh the ubiquitous 'bawled' (or 'bowled' or 'bulled' - it depends) peanut - the stands are all over Georgia roadsides right now. Boiled peanuts are a favored tailgate (really, anytime) snack now that football season's coming to a close. Better than beer nuts, some say, but I can't seem to stomach the things. I'm always amazed at the regional differences in boiled peanuts - I can never decide if it's the peanuts or the method that makes them different, but there is a noticeable difference between states, or even within the states (ex: North Georgia vs. South Georgia). Hope you enjoyed making them!

Boiled peanuts go hand-in-hand with FSU football here in Florida! I miss both horribly now that I'm attending a school that doesn't have a football team! At least I'm still in the south and can get boiled peanuts from road-side stands and produce stands! Go Noles!

I love the Vietnamese version of these best. A few tiny, fiery chili peppers tossed in the water with a few star anise. Delicious! Still, Old Bay and Paprika sound delightful as well.

Never tried or even seen these before. I did buy a bag of them the other day specifically for this task. Does it matter if they are already roasted? And what about if you shelled them first?

Yes, they need to be raw, and in the shell. You can likely get them at the Davis farmers market, Nick, though it's quickly getting to the end of the season. ~Elise

I got completely addicted to goobers (boiled peanuts) when I lived in FL for 6 years - fortunately there's no intervention required, just some salt, cayenne, tabasco, and beer and a crock pot. Yeah, I like them "Cajun Style." And they're best when boiled in a beer-water-salt base.

For supplies, I recommend going to www.nutsonline.com. They have raw peanuts by the pound and they have pre-boiled (regular, Cajun) in cans - depending on your needs for instant gratification. Shipping is cheap. You can also find them boiled and frozen on eBay.

And if you have left over raw peanuts (uncooked) don't forget the birds and squirrels who love them this time of year.

I love boiled peanuts -- I recently asked my grandfather for the recipe, and he just said, "Get a bag of peanuts, dump 'em into some water and boil 'em until they're done."

This is a bit more of what I was looking for :) Same idea, but with the measurements and instructions that I need!

Kentucky is still too far north for boiled peanuts, so my family always stops at the roadside stands in S.C. whenever we pass through. Eating them while driving is an adventure, especially hot out of the pot. I have memories of my dad boiling huge pots of peanuts on fall Friday afternoons and taking grocery sacks full to the high school football games, just to share with people in the stands near him. Based on his recipe you don't have nearly enough salt, though.
People have their own preferences, a lot of folks love those big Virginia peanuts, but I've always liked the smaller ones--they seem to stay more firm.

I'm with Jean P. This North Carolinian is NOT fond of them! Of course you rarely see them in Western N.C. Sometimes Down East, you do. I'll just stick with my grits!

Boiled Peanuts are also very popular in Hawaii, although our variation is Chinese inspired, boiled with star-anise and Hawaiian salt. They have a unique, addictive flavor and texture, not unlike Edamame. They're so common here that you can buy them pre-made in bags in every supermarket and corner convenience store!.

Here's a link to a basic Hawaiian Boiled Peanuts recipe: http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/526539#3759213

Wonderful! I had to do a double take this morning when I read the lastest updates. I grew up in Alabama. One of my fondest high school memories is giving a "Yankee" student teacher a bag of boiled peanuts to sample. When we asked her later how she liked them, she said she didn't much care for them. We were dumbfounded...until we found out she had eaten shell and all.

LOL, oh, that's a riot. :-) ~Elise

This is great Elise. I did a whole blog post about you posting about boiled peanuts. I think it is just great that you feature so many southern dishes here.

Being from south Georgia and growing up on Boiled Peanuts, I think most recipes neglect to state 'Green Peanuts' instead of just 'Raw Peanuts'. Raw Peanuts that you buy in the store have been dried out, take a lot longer to boil and do not taste nearly as good.

Good point! I'll elaborate in the recipe. ~Elise

As a child from an Alabama peanut farm, let me encourage you to seek "green" raw peanuts, not to be confused with the environmentally responsible growing conditions, but with their undried state. They are even harder to find, but well worth the effort.

We steal ours from a field in South Georgia after they have been pulled up and before they have picked them up. I count on my family ties from keeping me out of jail. Ha ha.

Dang. I picked up some green peanuts at the local farmers market a few weeks ago and they've been sitting there ever since with me trying to figure out what to do with them. Alas, I think they've already spoiled :(

The best peanut for boiling (green or dry) is the Valencia. The worst peanut for boiling (very thick-shelled and almost impossible to boil) is the Virginia roasting peanut. The Valencia is a thinner shelled, longer, skinnier peanut with up to four nuts in a shell. It is grown mostly in New Mexico. The boiled peanut stands use the Valencia.

I boiled some locally purchased Virginia peanuts for a total of 16 hours over two days and they never got done! Valencias are done in 4 hours or so (faster if pressurized).

Valencias are much harder to find in normal markets but it is definitely worth the effort to locate them. It will make your boiled peanut experiance a lot better.

If you want boiled peanuts year around, you can freeze them after boiling them. You can reheat them in the microwave or in boiling water. If reheated in water, add some salt as fresh water will take some from the peanut. I generally taste the water to make sure I have the right amount of salt. I like the saltiness to be about what ocean seawater.

There is nothing better than eating a steaming pan of boiled peanuts and washing it down with a grape Nehi soda, on a tin roofed porch with a gentle rain coming down. That was my grandparents house and porch. Fond memories from long ago.

I saw some raw peanuts at a fruit stand last week, so I grabbed a bag of them. Mine have been simmering in the crockpot for a while now and I think they're JUST ready for eating. I never thought of using crab boil - I use Cajun seasoning. I've still got some raw peanuts left, so I'll def. try them with the crab boil!

When I lived in Florida, boiled peanuts were in just about every convenience store. You scooped them out of the crock pot with a slotted spoon into a styrofoam cup. Now that I'm back home in Louisiana, they're hard to find. The first time I tasted boiled peanuts, I thought my friend was crazy for eating wet peanuts but this is my favorite way to eat them now!!

I remember one girl trying to take dry roasted peanuts and try to boil them. Problem was, with the peanuts in that dry state, it wouldn't soak up any water.

I haven't tried the raw peanuts from NAS Jax's commissary, but that will be next. I was always fond of the green peanuts which they said were immature peanuts before the drying process. I just remember the tell tale sign that the peanut is a green peanut because of the reddish purple flesh inside the peanut, whereas the roadside stands in northeast Florida are tan colored fleshed peanuts, the colors showing after being boiled. To me, the green peanuts had more flavor than the tan colored peanuts inside the hull.

Down here in Florida, my dad tried growing peanuts. We grew them without problem, but because of the sandy soil around here, ten washings couldn't get all the sand off the peanuts. We made sure to keep finding ways via grocery stores and produce stands to get the green peanuts though. Now my wife is addicted to them, provided they are the low salt version I make, and not the heart attack inducing high salt content that my dad tries ruining my batches with.

One thing I've noticed, is that nobody mentioned drinking sweet tea with the boiled peanuts. They say boiled peanuts is "Country Caviar", and sweet tea is the "House Wine of the South". I need to try that putting honey in with the brine, but I usually drink my 1 and a fourth cup of sugar infused gallon of tea with my boiled peanuts, and it creates a sweet and sour sensation. For a six quart pressure cooker full of floating peanuts, I usually put in just a fourth to one half of a cup of salt. I believe this enhances the flavor of the peanut meat, without making it so all you can taste is salt and feel your arteries flare up unlike how my dad makes it.

Howdy, I was raised in the southern part of Alabama, and bowled Peanuts,were a weekend treat for us kids.I remember the smell of them cooking.
I have lived in the mid west now for about 24 years. No one has heard of them unless going south for Vacations. I have since then decided to open a small place, selling boiled peanuts,Lemon aid,and,sweet Ice tea. I would say that 1 out of 3 people whom try them like them. They are very addictive if you like'm. If you haven't tried them please do,they are good and good for ya!
thank ya'll for the memories....

I've been boiling and selling peanuts at a roadside stand, at local fairs, and local festivals in mid Georgia for nearly 15 years now. Just browsing the web for Cajun recipies and am amazed how many don't understand the differences between "green" or "dry" boiled peanuts.
- Green peanuts are fresh out of the ground, washed, and sold immediatlly before drying out or going bad because most retailers keep them in coolers and refridgerators to keep them moist which in turn causes them to grow mold. The majority of them are shipped to companies for different types of processing like peanut butter, peanut oil, ect. The best time to get green peanuts is when the farmers start pulling them out of the ground which (in south Ga) is between the end of July to the beginning of September. Florida's harvesting time is longer b-cuz their climate is warmer. Getting them any other time would certainly mean they have been frozen raw then thawed for selling which leads to loss of original flavor and texture when boiled. Green peanuts are best for those that want to boil their own due to the short boiling times (usually 3 to 4 hrs on full boil longer on simmer or crock potting) Note: Boiling green peanuts too long causes the meat to adhere to the shell. After cracking the peanut in half, you'll have to dig with your teeth like a mad chipmunk to get the meat out of the shells which is virtually impossible.
- Dried peanuts are pulled out of the ground, washed, tumbled in dryers to clean all shell surfaces and extract all moisture, then stored for shipping. They are more suited for us peanut vendors. The drying allows the peanuts to last all year long. They can also be roasted or fried. Yes "fried"! The down side is that it takes anywhere from 9 to 15 hrs to boil them (according to what time of the year they're bought). I prefer Valencia peanuts from New Mexico. They're not too meaty, just the right snacking size (I call them the "ball-park peanut"), they have a red skin that illiminates the meat from sticking to the shells which allows for longer simmering/selling times, they taste better the longer they simmer (3 days max for me), ect. the list of benefits for me are long.
I should mention that there is a wide difference in taste between a green and dry boiled peanut so give each a try. Not all vendors sell the Valencia peanut so try different stands. Ask what type they offer and for God's sake TRY BEFORE YOU BUY!!!

Here are two main things to look for:

Sour - Just tasting isn't the best method. Smell the steam from the pot. Check for a hint of a moldy smell. Still can't tell? Ask the vendor to bring up a scoop full for you and take two of the lighter colored nuts, let them cool off for about 30 seconds, then rub em with your thumb and finger to see if they're slick.
Burnt - Sometimes the vendor will let the pot run out of water and burn the peanuts at the bottom of the pot. To correct their mistake they will pull all the unburnt peanuts out, clean the pot, and refresh the pot with the unburnt ones. This may or may not effect the taste of the peanut but if your like me aroma is the best part of eating boiled peanuts. There's nothing worse than jumping back in your and opening a container of peanuts to get a wiff of burnt peanuts. So it's best to have the vendor put a lid on the cup or close the bag tight, get in your car, then open the container and take a big wiff before you drive off.

Mikey's Hot Boiled Peanuts - Located in Middle Ga. Corner of Hwy129 and Hwy212. Stop by and I'll share some peanut boiling secrets with you ;-)

Thank you for the tips Mikey! ~Elise

Lorraine, this time of year, you may be able to find them at a 99 Ranch Market. I saw some there last week when shopping for some daikon.