Defining Ingredients: Peanut Butter

When considering this prompt, I decided that as opposed to choosing a food item with which I had little exposure, or some item that “stood out” to me, why not choose one that is very universal? How about an item that was a mainstay of most elementary-school lunches and afternoon summer snacks? With the exception of those with that pesky peanut allergy, I think we all have had at least tasted the sweet, nutritious yet calorie packed spread, peanut butter.

In the grand scheme of human history, we haven’t spent much time with the now-famous buttery spread. Peanuts were ground up into a much grainier paste than we are used to now for centuries by the inhabitants of their native countries of Brazil, Mexico, Peru, and the Caribbean (Katz). Peanuts were then transported by explorers to parts of Africa and Asia, still many years before they came to the United States. Finally, it was the British slave trade from the Caribbean that brought the illustrious legume into North American (ibid).

Peanuts were a cheap, easy to grow plant that slaves primarily grew in their own gardens and eventually the planting expanded into the fields. Ironically it was George Washington Carver, the offspring of a former slave, who was familiar with it in his own family and noted the economical value of farming the plant on a much larger scale. The production of peanuts increased, but not much beyond their intended use of cooking and finger food (Katz).

Then, in 1894, a Seventh-Day Adventist camp director (SDAs are vegetarian) named John Harvey Kellogg came up with the idea of finely grinding up the nuts into a paste. The texture of peanuts and the heavy oil content within allowed them to mix into a very smooth paste, and acted as a substitute for the dairy-heavy butter of the time. He decided not to patent the design, but started the first company dedicated to the production of Peanut Butter called Sanitas Nut Food Company, named after the SDA sanitarium where it was discovered (Katz).

The new Peanut Butter received nearly immediate praise and was picked by vegetarians especially, as it was a calorie and protein filled substitute to meat that could be enjoyed guiltlessly. It was even considered a mild delicacy to some, a simple product that had gone over a seemingly extensive process to turn into this sweet, sticky butter. In actuality, there is little else in peanut butter than the peanuts themselves, just a whole lot of nuts for their proportional amount of butter.

Today, peanut butter has become an almost exclusively American icon. It is made in some places around the world, but its history is so deeply ingrained in American history that it is one of the few items that is truly American, unlike the purported American icons like hamburgers and apple pie. The 1920s were the second “big wave” for peanut butter with the invention of sliced bread. At this same time, candy manufacturers realized the whole new market they could open up by putting the sticky, sweet butter inside chocolate and combined with nougat. Nowadays Americans eat (by the jar alone, not including cooking or candy) 857 million pounds of peanut butter annually, and can be found in 83% of American households (Katz).

Now, to the health aspects of peanut butter. Nuts are superpacked for their size with calories, protein, saturated fat, and sodium. Peanut butter it little more than nuts and some sugar, but there are about 850 peanuts in your average sized, 18 oz. jar of peanut butter (Enserink). The USDA determines that 2 tablespoons are a serving size, and that represents 20% of your DAILY fat intake. That’s a lot of peanuts.

This is where the community has become split on peanut butter. The American appetite has taken one of the most efficient ways to get your daily fat and calories and made it seem like one of the worst things available (Enserink). A few bites is great for you, but when you sit down in front of the TV eating out of a jar of peanut butter with a spoon like a bowl of soup, it is like eating pure saturated fat and all nutritional value is lost. Some people are doing it right, just not in America. Brilliant researchers came up with idea of bringing peanut butter to impoverished and undernourished parts of the world. A few spoonfuls can substitute an entire meal for some people and provide more nutrients in one scoop than most other single substances, especially to an impoverished baby that could not chew or digest many other foods (Enserink).

I am on the rowing team here at DU, which means I have practice very early every morning during the week. Between getting up at 5:20 AM, driving to Cherry Creek Reservoir, having practice, driving back, showering and getting ready for class at 9 AM, I have very little time for breakfast. Here, I discovered the magic of peanut butter. Just one scoop before and a few scoops afterwards can get me through my 9 AM class to when I get out at 2 PM or 3 PM, depending on the day. My parents are both extremely active and shared this trick with me years ago. Now that I have so little time in the mornings, it has become even more necessary to stay on top of my day. Hopefully this has been informative to all of you and shown how just a little of a good thing really can go a long way.

Katz, Solomon. “Encyclopedia of Food and Culture.” New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 2003. 57-57. Print

Enserink, Martin. “The Peanut Butter Debate.” AAAS: Science 322.5898 (2008): 36-38. Online.