APRICOTS TRIED TO KILL ME
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) note that apricot seeds “may have substantial amounts of chemicals which are metabolized to cyanide.” Estimates state that eating 50 to 60 apricot kernels could deliver a lethal dose of cyanide. Cyanide poisoning can occur at much lower levels, however.
Sometimes, we are ill-equipped for many of the things we are confronted with in this life.
It’s too bad we have to learn some things the hard way because when were born there was no book of instructions.
Circumstances and lack of information fooled me into making a false assumption about the safety of apricot kernels.
I never heard of such a thing as what happened to me. I almost had a death certificate stating — accidental cyanide poisoning.
It all stems from a wonderful breezy day in San Francisco with the love of my life. How wonderful it was to breathe the salt air. Going through the little shops at Fisherman’s Wharf and then a delightful Japanese dinner featuring unagi.
If you’ve never had that, you need to do that. unagi is seasoned eel. A delicious delicacy. For dessert we had green tea flavored ice cream.
The following day we decided to go to Chinatown. We needed some of those sweetened noodle squares that are very much like rice crispy squares, but better. I love to try the delicacies that you can find in some of the Chinese grocery stores in Chinatown. On an impulse I bought a bag of apricot kernels. I never saw that before and had to try some . They were delicious. It’s a strange thing about apricot kernels. They taste like prussic acid. Prussic acid has another name — cyanide.
I was never too concerned about cyanide or prussic acid because it is a small boy I had a butterfly collection. As a part of my obtaining butterflies my dad set me up with a butterfly net and a cyanide jar. The Cyanide jar kills the butterfly which can then be mounted for display .
I knew you weren’t supposed to breathe the cyanide but you can’t help but get a sniff of it now and then. I found it to be kind of interesting and delicious smelling. Sort of like burnt almond.
So I as you can see, I had no fear of prussic acid or cyanide when I bought the apricot kernels in Chinatown. They tasted like prussic acid and quite frankly, I know I shouldn’t, but I enjoy the smell of prussic acid. I thought it must be in such tiny amounts that it doesn’t matter. This is just food, it isn’t my cyanide jar. I enjoy the smell of gasoline and skunk also. I like wierd smells.
So I have the experience of my cyanide jar telling me that cyanide is bad. However, I assumed that apple seeds and peach kernels and apricot kernels apparently have a tiny bit of cyanide, but not enough to matter, just enough to enjoy the flavor. After all, I ate a whole bag of apricot kernels in SF and I didn’t die.
Moving on ahead, it became apricot season at the farmers market. We bought a lot of apricots and I saved the seeds on all of them. I had quite a bag of seeds but the kernal was inside a tough exterior. I was sitting on the floor cracking the little guys open and eating them right out of the shell. I bet I ate 15 or 20 of them because they were so delicious.
And then “it” happened. The world started getting very dark and my vision got very strange and so did my reality. I called poison control because I never experienced anything like this before and it definitely came from eating apricot kernels. They told me to hightail it over to emergency and they called ahead and had them prepare my black milkshake. Have you ever had a black milkshake? It’s a milkshake made with activated charcoal and it did not taste as good as apricot kernels.
I know you’re all on pins and needles about what happened, however I did not die, so don’t worry.
When I practically killed myself eating apricot kernels, I did not have a computer. Computers were uncommon at that time or I would’ve asked about the active ingredients in an apricot kernel. I just now found out that in order to neutralize the toxic effect of apricot kernels, you need to toast the kernels in the oven. Then they are safe to eat.
Too soon we get old. Too late we get smart .
