I’m staring at a 20 oz tin of chocolate covered peanuts on my desk. It was a Christmas gift from my mom and a step up in size from what she gave me in previous years. She must really believe I mean business now when I put that on my wish list. To be fair to her, I didn’t use to care much for snacking nuts, so she was probably waiting to see if I was truly up to the task. Although these babies are double dipped, so it’s really more chocolate than peanut—basically the pill that Miracle Max gives Westley in The Princess Bride, only in this case the pill is a Virginia Diner peanut.
It’s important to me that you know Virginia has exceptional peanuts. If you think “peanuts” you might think “Georgia” and you might think “boiled” but oh no no…you should think Virginia. They’re bigger than your average peanut, they’re called “diner,” and, according to the packaging, they’re “simply legendary.” And that’s pretty much all I know about them, and that’s all I really need to know.
Last year, when I got my JV-sized tin, I looked up the story of why they’re called diner peanuts but I don’t remember a single part of the story. My phone is sitting on my desk, right next to the peanuts in question, so I could look it up, but I’m probably trying to use my phone less in the new year or something. So instead I’ll just speculate. Peanuts are my new Las Vegas neck pillow.
A plausible story would be that some diner somewhere in Virginia started having big beautiful peanuts somewhere on their menu and they became so popular that someone devoted themselves fully to the peanut game. Maybe it was a Five Guys thing where you could have a snack while waiting for your food and throw the shells wherever you liked with the authority and abandon of a Tudor monarch. It was probably the son of the owner of the diner who decided to pursue their legume prospects, shunning his inheritance:
“No, my boy! I need you at the diner—you’ve yet to master our hash-ed browns! Who shall bear the mantle of this place once I pass?”
“Father, you know I love this diner. I have here passed many a happy night, pouring coffee into the mud-brown mugs of our dear patrons, passing out plates of burgers and omelets in equal measure, watching the peaceful flickering of the lightbulb-lit pie display… but the peanuts, Father! Look now upon this young boy in the booth by the bathroom—see the glee that lights his face as he de-shells another glorious pearl. These are what make this place special. I must away. I must share this treasure.”
“I see that you will not be persuaded, son. Though I still think it a fool’s errand… I give you my blessing and wish thee well. I ask only this in return: that you call them diner peanuts so that all might know their magic is not their own… but rather the magic of… this diner.”
Or maybe this goes even further back, to our dear commonwealth’s namesake: the long-ruling, virginal Elizabeth I. (It’s almost as important to me as knowing about the peanuts to know that Virginia is named after the queen of England being a virgin. Wild.) Maybe there’s a Shakespeare-era-inconsistent-spelling thing happening and “diner” is meant to mean “dinner” and because everyone was so much littler back then, you could just have one big peanut for dinner and be filled right up. (Now I’m picturing a bunch of Borrowers-sized people running around in big Elizabethan ruffles and that’s bringing me great joy.)
Now I’m looking at my tin again… and I’m completely rattled to discover that they’re actually chocolate and peanut butter covered peanuts. I’ve already eaten so many of these and didn’t even notice there was peanut butter in the picture.
What does that mean for my taste buds? What does that say about my ability to accurately perceive the world around me?
Am I just racing through my day, not even tasting the sun sweet berries of the Earth, singing with all the voices of the mountain, or painting with all colors of the wind?
Who am I to espouse the grandeur of this oft-salted snack when I do not even register their taste? When I do not even pause to google whether or not they’re even grown in Virginia despite writing these very words on a laptop that does, in fact, have internet access?
I might just need to eat a real meal. Maybe there’s a diner open nearby.
Christina Ribbens (’19) graduated with a major in history and minors in studio art and data science. After working in campus ministry for a few years, she’s getting her master’s in public humanities at Georgetown University in Washington, DC. She has a benevolent dependency on tea, is always down for a game of pick-up basketball, and would love to have you over for pancakes sometime.
