It’s best to cook with raw, unfettered nuts right out of the shell…then you can salt or flavor them to your liking. But the skins can be quite troublesome! Here’s what to do…
To skin almonds and walnuts, first boil a pot of water and lower to a gentle simmer. Then put the shelled nuts in a strainer and plunge the strainer into the simmering water. After two minutes, take the nuts out of the water. When they’re cool enough to handle, each nut has a specific way to peel. For almonds, pinch the rounded (not the pointy) end of each almond and watch it slip right out of its skin. For walnuts, gently rub each walnut to release the skin or rub a bunch of walnuts with a clean cloth, leaving the skins attached to the cloth and the nuts skin-free to pick out and cook with.
More about nuts…
