The avocado has become the symbol of the Millennial Generation (because older generations are reductive?). After an Australian millionaire somehow concluded it was avocado toast (not double-digit unemployment or widespread underemployment or the growing bubble of student loans or horrible financial policies by Baby Boomers) keeping Millennials from buying houses, the avocado went from trendy fruit to anti-youth culture rallying cry. Time even attempted to make “hold my avocado” happen, in the saddest case of “Hello, fellow kids” we’ve ever seen.
But, hold your scorn! It turns out the avocado is good for more than just healthy fats and demonstrating severe out-of-touchness: It might help you live forever. Or, at least, grinding up the husk around the seed and adding it to your guac might.
A team at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, presenting their research to the American Chemical Society, was curious as to what might be lurking in the stuff we throw out, so they ground down the husks around avocado seeds and measured what they found with gas chromatography–mass spectrometry. They found a lot: 116 compounds, including useful stuff like dodecanoic acid, which helps reduce atherosclerosis, and behenyl alcohol, a key ingredient in many antibiotics.
Get ready for avo-husk smoothies motherf*ckers! The larger point, of course, is that too often what we view as garbage can be reprocessed into something better. After all, this is just the husk around the avocado seed. What else might we have been throwing away all these years that might have some sort of use? That’s a question further research will need to answer, but, for now, skin that seed, grind it up, and throw it into your guac. Hey, even if it doesn’t give you eternal life, it’ll add some texture!
(via New Atlas)
