Thank you for writing this comprehensive piece about the macadamia nut, Linda. At our last home we had four well established macadamia nut trees. It was my job when the grandchldren visited to hand out buckets and spend a few hours collecting the fallen nuts.

The we would remove any outer casings present and have some fun cracking them.

I actually have a nut cracker designed specifically for macadamia nuts. It is metal and in a triangular shape ... the nut sits inside and you screw the handle until it crushes the shell, and you can peel it off and remove the nut. Trying to crack them with a hammer is too dangerous, though possible.