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Peanut Butter Day: Going Nuts over NIST's Standard Reference Peanut Butter (2016)

Maintaining a social media account involves keeping track of the many random celebrations that can provide an excuse to post a story that otherwise might not

While NIST chemist Carolyn Burdette spent a cold morning last February testing samples of peanut butter (yes, that’s part of her job), a visitor to our Gaithersburg, Md., campus was snapping a photo of a jar of the stuff, which is on display in our lobby. The image he posted to Twitter and imgur quickly shot around social media and stories soon appeared on sites including BoingBoing, the Food Network and Smithsonian magazine. NIST seems an unlikely source for peanut butter, but we actually sell a variety of “foods,” including spinach, low-calorie cranberry juice cocktail and something called “meat homogenate.” Although you could theoretically consume them, that’s not what they are intended for—and the grocery store probably has much tastier, and certainly less expensive, options.

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