I've enjoyed Planter's Peanuts for over 30 years. In my opinion, they were the standard of quality against which other peanuts were judged. Over the past two years, I've noticed wide variations in the amount of salt on the peanuts. Normal peanuts (ie: not lightly salted) sometimes have very little salt or sometimes too much to eat. It seems that quality control has declined.

A worse problem occurred recently. I bought a 16 oz can of Planter's cocktail peanuts. They tasted fine at first. Then I noticed a bitter taste in my mouth. I looked in the can and saw oil on the nuts and on the walls of the can, something I normally don't see. I assume the nuts were rancid.

I know peanuts often have small amounts of aflotoxin, a highly potent carcinogen. I was worried that the rancid peanuts might have had high amounts of aflotoxin.

Needless to say, I won't be buying Planters peanuts again.