Rant #1,383: Peanut Butter!

I have to preface this Rant by saying that I am not a nut person.

I generally do not like nuts, whether they are pistachio, cashews, or whatever.

I do not gobble down nuts like some people do ...

But I do love peanut butter.

To me, peanut butter is not only nourishing, it is sentimental, one of the most nostalgic foods people of my generation ate to our heart's content when we were little.

Whether alone or with jelly--and by the way, I hate jelly--peanut butter conjures up your young life. When you eat peanut butter on a slice of bread, you are eight years old again.

But some people cannot eat peanut butter. They can't even be around peanuts, because they are allergic to them, and they can get very sick from them, and in some extreme cases, exposure to peanuts can be fatal.

It is amazing to think about this, but the very generation that lived on peanut butter spawned the generation of kids where this problem first came up.

Most schools ban peanuts and peanut butter on their premises, and foods that use any extraction of peanuts must be listed, and many restaurants also follow suit with their menus.

It is a terrible thing that some kids cannot eat peanuts or peanut butter ... but there many be some changes afoot to allow even the most susceptible kids to enjoy this childhood treat.

In the first, researchers have come up with a peanut patch, much like a nicotine patch for those who want to quite smoking.

Worn on the arm, the patch allows kids who were allergic to peanuts to take in a minimum amount of peanuts a day, like maybe four peanuts. This would equal out to about a dab of peanut butter, but for these kids who were highly allergic to peanuts, it is something truly amazing.

It is also something that when worn, will allow them to be around and ingest foods that have peanut-related ingredients in them.

The second is something perhaps even more remarkable.

Researchers in England, at King's College in London, have given infants thought to have a low tolerance for peanuts low amounts of nut, and they have found that over time, these infants build up an immunity to peanuts, and when they reach beyond the toddler age, they can actually enjoy peanut butter and peanut products just like everyone else.

The babies used in the research were checked to make sure that they didn't already have a peanut allergy before they were fed foods that included peanuts.

More research needs to be done, but by giving these infants just a slight amount of peanuts in their diet, they can fight off whatever ill effects they might have had if they didn't go through this regimen.

Simply amazing, and no, that therapy is just experimental, it is not in the U.S. yet.

So someday, with all of these advances in tow, perhaps all kids will be able to enjoy peanuts, peanut butter, and overall, we won't have to deal with anyone with peanut allergies anymore.

We will just have to deal with kids who hate peanut butter.

Believe it or not, my two kids, whose parents reveled in peanut butter as kids and still love it as adults, hate peanut butter.

They won't eat it, don't like it, and to me, they are truly nuts.

But to each his own.

I guess it means more peanut butter for my wife and I.

And make it chunky, if you please.