Cashews

I was reading about cashews and got a kick out of the interesting words:

The Cashew is a tree in the plant family Anacardiaceae. Anacardium occidentale is a small evergreen tree with leathery textured leaves that are elliptic to obovate. The flowers are produced in a panicle or corymb.

On the tree you will see what appears to be a pear-shaped fruit. However, it is actually a pseudofruit or false fruit that develops from the receptacle of the cashew flower. The false fruit is called the cashew apple.

The true fruit of the cashew tree is a kidney shaped drupe that grows at the end of the pseudofruit. The drupe develops first on the tree and then the peduncle expands into the pseudofruit. Within the true fruit is the cashew nut. The seed is surrounded by a double shell containing a caustic phenolic resin, urushiol, a potent skin irritant toxin (also found in the related poison-ivy).

So, there you have it.