For everything you ever need to know about nuts, the Nuts for Life website is your place. Facilitated by the Australian Nut Industry Council in partnership with nut industry members, it is a one-stop shop for industry news, health and nutrition, dietary info, recipes and more.

Here are some fun facts about nuts:

• A nut is a particular form of dry fruit consisting of a hard or tough shell protecting a kernel which is usually edible. In general usage, a wide variety of dry seeds are called nuts, but botanically a nut has a single seed, hard shell and protective husk. Examples of true nuts are hazelnuts, walnuts and pecans. Peanuts are legumes and not true nuts; nor are almonds, which have a fleshy coat like a plum.
• Nuts are good for us, and Australian nuts are the way to go. We grow a variety of nuts in Australia – almonds, peanuts, macadamias (of course!), walnuts, pistachios, pecans, cashews and hazelnuts. And since we’re being loose with our nut definition, let's include sunflowers and pumpkin seeds.
• Macadamias, also known as 'Kindal Kindal' by many Aboriginal peoples, are the most well-known and widely available native ingredients. They are great in savoury or sweet dishes and make a great nut milk.
• I recently heard that an enthusiast in Tasmania is looking into growing pine nuts, the edible fruit of pine trees, which traditionally come from China. Unfortunately, we will not see the “fruits” of his labour for many years.
• The rule of thumb for optimal nutrition is to have a healthy handful (30g) of nuts every day, which currently only 2 per cent of Australians eat, a study published in Public Health Nutrition found.
• Nuts are a source of plant protein with different health benefits to other foods in the protein food group such as tofu, legumes and animal protein. They contain unsaturated fatty acids and dietary fibre, and are rich in polyphenols, phytosterols, folate, Vitamin E, selenium and magnesium.
• Apart from peanuts, which are legumes, nuts are expensive. This is the result of a combination of factors including the difficulty of growing and harvesting them, low yield compared to other crops, difficulties of pollination (including bee decline and the effect of disease such as the Varoa mite) and the “health food factor” driving up price.

So, the bottom line is eat a handful of nuts every day. Easy ways to get more nuts into your day are eating them as a snack, adding them to salads or to your breakfast porridge or muesli. Freshly ground nut butter, consisting of nothing but the nut (peanut, almond, macadamia) is always better than the multiple ingredient version from the supermarket.