skinning nuts

[Guest guest]

Hey folks,

Has anyone skinned nuts before? How do you do it?

I skinned three cups of hazelnuts for Christmas baking, and found it a

tremendously time-consuming and tedious process. The NT directions were to

bake the hazelnuts at 300 degrees for a few minutes till the skins cracked

open, then squeeze and rub them bound together tightly in a dishtowel. I did

this, but it only removed about half the skins or so, and I had to do a lot

of trimming by hand. The hazelnut shortcake only took about 20 minutes to

make total once I had dehydrated, soaked, skinned hazelnuts; however,

cracking the nuts open and particularly skinning them took probably close to

five hours!

I really love the hazelnut shortcake recipe, and it was a big hit with the

family, and would like to make it again to bring somewhere, but this process

is crazy, and if I end up doing it it is only because I'm on vacation from

school and laid off from my job for the month. I was hoping I could find

skinned hazelnuts for, say, twice the price. However, the only hazelnuts I

could find skinned were $8.99 a pound!!!

I would quickly turn the price of two pie crusts from 3 or 4 dollars total,

all the ingredients, to over $15.

Does anyone have a better, less tedious, method of skinning nuts that can

reduce the time spent to, say, a half hour? Or reduce the time AT ALL?

TIA very very much for any help!!!

Chris

____

" What can one say of a soul, of a heart, filled with compassion? It is a

heart which burns with love for every creature: for human beings, birds, and

animals, for serpents and for demons. The thought of them and the sight of

them make the tears of the saint flow. And this immense and intense

compassion, which flows from the heart of the saints, makes them unable to

bear the sight of the smallest, most insignificant wound in any creature.

Thus they pray ceaselessly, with tears, even for animals, for enemies of the

truth, and for those who do them wrong. "

--Saint Isaac the Syrian