When my dad visits, he wants to eat some Aunt Ruby’s peanuts. I understand why.
Really, my dad should be writing this.
It’s not that I don’t love Aunt Ruby’s Peanuts — that’s the entire premise of this column. But when my parents come to visit and I ask if there’s anything they’d like to eat or any snacks I can have on hand, my dad asks for nuts. And on their most recent visit, he was disappointed I didn’t have one brand in particular.
Nevermind the fact that we had a container of unsalted and roasted whole cashews left over from his last trip to town. He wanted something else. Something specific. Something he’s come to associate with visiting North Carolina from New England.
He wanted Aunt Ruby’s.
Made in the small town of Enfield, North Carolina in the heart of the state’s peanut country, the family-run company behind it (A&B Milling Company) started in 1945. And while Aunt Ruby’s is based just over an hour northeast of where I live in Raleigh, they’re really not any more accessible to me than to my dad who lives in Massachusetts, because Aunt Ruby is a postal service queen.
That is to say, this is a mail-order business. Maybe they get to my door slightly faster, but I’ve never seen them retailed at a store around here, and I couldn’t just grab my dad a can of their cashews or honey-roasted peanuts upon learning of his specific longing. The good news is, that means even if you’re in rural Oregon or Boise City, Oklahoma, you can get a box shipped to you.
Having tried more than a half dozen different creations, I can definitively say my favorite is the Chocolate Peanut Clusters. They’re a fan favorite as well, and people wait all year to receive them, because the company refuses to ship them when it’s too hot for fear of delivering an inferior product. It could also be because these are hand-dipped clusters, an incredibly time-consuming affair that has to be incredibly rare in the 21st Century.
They also sell White Chocolate Cashew Clusters, if that’s more your thing. I’ll vouch for those, too, but it’s hard to hold a candle to the chocolate peanut clusters.
My dad wouldn’t pick either — he’s trying to avoid sugar as much has he can. But there’s a wide array of other choices, from Country Style Peanuts to Cajun Style Peanuts. I might have to order him a sampler pack of Aunt Ruby’s Peanuts for his birthday or Hanukkah. (Definitely consider them for Christmas!)
I’ll be over here snacking on the Peanut Brittle, though.
By the way, if you love peanuts, you’ll probably be a fan of these great recipes:
All photos courtesy of Aunt Ruby’s. This is not sponsored content — just our editor’s genuine endorsement. Be sure to check out some of our other Obsessed columns, like this one on our editor’s favorite beef jerky.