SOUTHAMPTON COUNTY, Va. — I caught up with farmer Elisha Barnes as he started his day pulling up peanut vines as the annual peanut harvest got underway. And he was pleased with what he found.
“Oh, those peanuts are good,” he said.
Barnes does something to his peanuts that no one else does anymore.
“What I do with my curing process creates a peanut that is sweeter because of the drying process,” said Barnes.
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The process is known as “shocking.” After the peanuts are turned up, the vines are then wrapped around poles.
“It sits on the poles for 6 weeks and it slowly dries to a sweetness and a character that you can’t get out of heat-cured peanuts,” said Barnes with a big grin of satisfaction.
It's the way all peanuts were cured in the old days.
"It's hard, its labor intensive, it is slow,” he said.
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So why do it this way?
“I don't think that words can explain why I would go through the labor of doing this. It's just a part of me it's a part of wanting to preserve history,” said Barnes.
His family has been farming peanuts and other crops in Southampton County since the 1900s.
"Peanuts were the largest agricultural product in the state of VA up until the '80s,” according to Marshall Rabil of the Hubbard Peanut Company in Sedley, Virginia.
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Rabil's grandmother, Dot Hubbard, founded the Hubbard Peanut company in 1954.
“We were growing more acres of peanuts in Southampton County than any other county in the country,” Rabil said.
The sandy soil in Virginia makes Virginia peanuts unique.
“It's a larger kernel. It’s what we experience at the baseball games when you eat them in shell peanut. They have a different texture, they’re larger, nice crunch to ‘em,” said Rabil.
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While the Hubbards didn't farm peanuts, Dot Hubbard is credited with pioneering the specialty food industry by manufacturing and shipping canned peanuts at a time when no one else was doing it.
“What made Dot’s peanuts special was the cook process and the size of the peanuts that she used. Dot would soak them in hot water and fry them in oil,” said her grandson.
And they’re still made that way today.
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Including Elisha’s single-origin peanut. Hubs is the only company to sell them because they’re unique, and it's a way to give back to the community. Two dollars from each can sold goes to the Food Bank of Southeastern Virginia.
“I think the food bank is the coolest part, knowing that you’re making such a visceral difference in your community you’re feeding families with this,” said Layla Barnes, Elisha's granddaughter.
The 21-year-old will be the 6th generation to carry on the tradition of farming peanuts this way.
“It's in our blood. After doing it enough, you fall in love with it,” said Layla.
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“All of that put together makes a life that you can’t get nowhere else,” her grandfather chimed in.
“I ain't gonna talk too much ‘cause it will draw tears out of both of us,” he said.
The Barnes and Hubbard families, positively part of the rich culture of our community.
To learn more about the Hubbard Peanut Company, click here.
