# 97. PISTACHIO
The pistachio, Pistacia vera is a small tree originally from Persia (Iran). The tree produces an important culinary nut.
Pistacia vera is often confused with other species in the genus Pistacia that are also known as pistachio.
These species can be differentiated from P. vera by their geographic distributions as well as their nuts. Their nuts are much smaller with a strong turpentine flavor and do not have a hard shell.
The Pistachio is one of two nuts mentioned in the Bible.Pistachios have been a part of the human diet at least since the late Paleolithic.
The fruit is a drupe, containing an elongated seed, which is the edible portion. The seed, commonly thought of as a nut, is only a culinary nut and not a botanical nut.
The fruit has a hard, whitish exterior shell. The seed has a mauvish skin and light green flesh, with a distinctive flavor. When the fruit ripens, the shell changes from green to an autumnal yellow/red and abruptly splits part way open with an audible pop.
The splitting open is a trait that has been selected by humans. Commercial cultivars vary in how consistently they split open.used in making ice creams. butter, paste, chocolate, halwa, and salads. The nuts can also be eaten whole, either fresh or roasted and salted.
July 2003, the FDA approved the first qualified health claim specific to nuts lowering the risk of heart disease: "Scientific evidence suggests (but does not prove) that eating 1.5 ounces or 42.5g per day of most nuts, such as pistachios, as part of a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol may reduce the risk of heart disease"
"The Pistachio Principle" describes methods of "fooling" one's body into eating less. One example used is that the act of de-shelling and eating pistachios one by one slows one's consumption allowing one to feel full faster after having eaten less.