By BILL EDWARDS<\/p>\n
In the 1970s Mounds and Almond Joy candy bars were advertised with the phrase: \u201cSometimes you feel like a nut, Sometimes You Don\u2019t, Almond Joy\u2019s got nuts, Mounds don\u2019t.\u201d While they did not share almonds, both Almond Joy and Mounds did share such \u201cnut\u201d sources as shredded coconut and chocolate. Undermining the jingle is that almonds are not true nuts, and, in fact, there are no true nut components in either candy bar.<\/p>\n
Almonds, coconut, and chocolate are better labeled as \u201cculinary nuts\u201d and botanically all are referred to as \u201cdrupes\u201d \u2014 a fleshy fruit with thin skin and a central stone containing the seed, such as a plum, cherry, almond, or olive. A true nut is classified by botanists as a type of fruit comprised of a shell and a seed.<\/p>\n
While a coconut and an almond have a hard shell and a seed, true nuts (such as acorns, chestnuts, and hazelnuts) are indehiscent \u2014 they don\u2019t split open to release their seeds when ripe. In the case of the coconut and the almond, the seed germinates and then sprouts from the end of the shell, which eventually splits (dehisces) the shell exposing the seed.<\/p>\n
So why is one of the few botanical nuts of North America much more frequently called an \u201cacorn\u201d instead of the much less used term \u201coaknut?\u201d The etymology is a little complex, which is often true for words that have derivations from many different countries and are used to identify something that has a highly varied and significant economic role for humans and major ecological impact.<\/p>\n
A search for the origins of the word \u201cacorn\u201d produces many conflicting, and somewhat esoteric, analyses. My interpretation is that \u201cacorn\u201d is a compound word consisting of \u201cac\/ak\u201d which refers to either the oak\/beech tree, or the open land where these trees grow, and \u201ccorn\u201d<\/strong> which refers to \u201cmast\u201d or the fruit of the trees.<\/p>\n For a view of the songs and loopy TV ads of the 1970s, go to Google and use the search term \u201csometimes you feel like a nut\u201d. Click on \u201cview all\u201d under the Images link. Be prepared to waste a lot of time.<\/p>\n \u2014 Bill Edwards is a trail guide at Mission Trails Regional Park.<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By BILL EDWARDS In the 1970s Mounds and Almond Joy candy bars were advertised with the phrase: \u201cSometimes you feel like a nut, Sometimes You Don\u2019t, Almond Joy\u2019s got nuts, Mounds don\u2019t.\u201d While they did not share almonds, both Almond Joy and Mounds did share such \u201cnut\u201d sources as shredded coconut and chocolate. Undermining the […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1114,"featured_media":232113,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11558","_seopress_titles_title":"Sometimes a nut, sometimes not","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11547,11558],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-232112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","category-mission-times-courier"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1114"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=232112"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232112\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/232113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=232112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=232112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=232112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}