Can you smell peanuts without triggering the allergy?

Roasted peanuts smell like they taste, which is pretty good.

I'm a huge fan of all nuts including peanuts.

Can't say I have a special preference for them specifically over other kinds, but they do taste differently. Meaning they have a specific taste recognizable as peanuts.

The texture is more creamy than anything other than cashews, and taste is a kind od sweet-salty-roasty combination that just has something special.

Don't know why anyone said they taste the same as "other nuts", no nuts taste the same. Pecans and walnuts are most similar (to each other) but there's still a difference.

I can't think of anything with a similar taste that you could safely try. Maybe smelling peanut butter would give you an idea if it's not too dangerous...

I am not much of a fan of nuts in general: I don't really like the flavours.

Peanuts are not 'nuts' of course, and to me it is precisely because they DON'T taste like 'regular nuts' that I am more attracted to them - although they are still a long way from the top of my savoury snack list.

As they aren't nuts, peanuts are different to true nuts. The yanks put them with chocolate and sweeteners, which are pretty awful, but they are a better savoury nut in my opinion. I eat peanut butter & tomato sandwiches, but Aussie peanut butter contains no sugar or sweeteners. Just nuts. So not really possible to know what that tastes like if you are in America. I love gado-gado, a south east asian sauce dish made of peanuts and chillis, very strong, and it wouldn't work with other nuts. It is served over roasted meat and vegetables. Really good.

They taste most similar to cashews I guess, but peanuts are not the same as cashews. They taste nothing like hazelnuts or walnuts or almonds. Some people love the flavour, others not so much, but you aren't missing much if you don't eat them. If it is safe to do so, smell them and see if you like the smell, I guess.

I like them all, but they are very different so it's a bit like asking why you like apples when there are also bananas and pears available.

So about peanuts, I guess their selling point is the crunchiness and the particular smell. They're pretty great salted too,, possibly the best salted nut.

Peanuts taste creamier than other nuts which aren't very substance-filled by comparison; ironically this might explain how peanut allergies work.

Peanuts go well with chocolate, and I sometimes use them in a stew, but for snacking, they're nowhere near as good as pistachios or cashews.

They're relatively cheap and provide a lot of nutritional value for the weight - I buy them in big bags straight from the farmer's market. Tree nuts (peanuts aren't actually nuts at all - they're legumes) are literally a luxury only the rich can afford in my country these days - kind of ironic since we're the world's top producer of macademia nuts.

Roasting them is actually important since that degrades aflatoxins - they also just taste better.

If you divide the flavor by the cost, they come out as a compelling snack option for us working-class folk.

Most other nuts are better, but their superior flavor scales nonlinearly with the cost -- definitely worse than O(n), probably about O(n^x). So for people that enjoy peanuts at approximately the population median value, they achieve more enjoyment by buying more peanuts compared to a smaller quantity of other, more delicious nuts.

So sort of the same reason more burgers are eaten in the USA than steaks. Or more instant noodles than braised abalone, in my part of the world.

Inasmuch as it's hard to explain why I like anything, peanuts are filling, and taste like oil, protein and salt. They have a nice smell. A bit similar to roasted chickpeas, but richer and oilier.

Just for fun -- Professor Science says that none of the items we are discussing are nuts. Cashews and almonds are drupes and peanuts are legumes.

They are one of the better nuts.

There was an episode of 3rd Rock From The Sun (at least I think it was 3rd rock) with a line about peanuts: "Peanuts aren't nuts you know, they're leguuuuuuuuuumes"

I mean, I prefer them because they're legumes, so they don't cause me to go into anaphylactic shock, but that's just me.

Peanuts are gross, I avoid them. I'm not allergic, but they are just so mealy and dry, cloying in scent and taste, overpowering everything they are in. I'd rather remain hungry than eat any peanuts.

Pistachios are amazing though, maybe the best tasting nuts/seeds I've encountered. Almonds are also quite good, and sunflower seeds by the handful are so tasty.