Nuts About Scrabble
Since our website address is https://www.scrabblenuts.co.nz I thought it was about time we looked at the word NUT.
How many words can you think of that finish with the letters NUT?
There are 36 words in total, but 6 of them are longer than 8 letters, so I will give you those in just a moment. Another one is just the word NUT, you might already know that one! That leaves 29 words of 4 to 8 letters which end in the word NUT.
Your quiz is to see how many of those 29 words you can think of for yourself.
Don't set your expectations too high on this quiz. My scoring system would be:
6 words = good
10 words = very good
14 words = excellent
Even though 14 is excellent it is still not even half of the possible answers!
While you are pondering those 4 to 8 letter words here is the list of 9 letters or more. They are less likely to be played in a game of scrabble, but maybe you can add NUT to the end of a longer word and get a good score by extending it to the double or triple word.
BITTERNUT The North American hickory tree
BLADDERNUT A genus of shrubs with inflated capsules
BUTTERNUT The oily nut of a North American tree
CANDLENUT The oil-yielding fruit of a tropical tree
GROUNDNUT The monkey nut
MOCKERNUT A type of hickory nut
The first thing to notice is the lack of consistency. Why is groundnut spelled as one word, but monkey nut has to be two words? The same question could be asked about hickory nut or brazil nut.
The English language is sometimes a law unto itself. All you can do is try to remember which ones you are allowed to spell as one word.
We are about to move on to the 29 words of 4 to 8 letters. If you want to think again before you see the answers then consider the fact that not all of them are nuts as in fruit and nut.
We will start with the only four letter word:
KNUT A swell or dandy.
If you have the right letters for this word you might consider just playing NUT in a good position where you can score a lot next time using your K
There are two words of 5 letters, both with connections to longer nut words
ARNUT An edible root tuber or a woodland umbellifer
EARTHNUT The same as an ARNUT. This can also be called an EARTHPEA
DONUT To surround a speaker to give an impression of a packed house
DOUGHNUT The same as DONUT
I don’t know about you, but I am much more familiar with the edible version of those two words. However there is a reason why this is the meaning given. It is because it is a verb, so you will know that words such as DONUTTED or DOUGHNUTTING are playable. Wouldn't that be nice!
Some nuts go by more than one name or have more than one spelling:
COCONUT, COCOANUT and COKERNUT are all the same thing
CHESNUT and CHESTNUT are the same nut, just different spellings
PIGNUT and HOGNUT are both the same nut. Presumably pigs like to eat them
OILNUT is another word for BUTTERNUT that we saw in the longer NUT words
COBNUT is not the same as HAZELNUT, but is a large roundish variety thereof
BEERNUT is a PEANUT with a sweet coating
BETELNUT is an ARECA nut. A shame that it is spelled as 2 words There is no
word from ‘aacenrtu’, but the 5 letter word is worth remembering anyway
And finally these ones don’t have connections to other NUT words:
BEECHNUT The nut of the beech
BREADNUT A tropical fruit (I remember it as an anagram of TURBANED)
ECONUT Someone concerned for the environment
GALLNUT A round gall on an oak tree. Also called NUTGALL
GUMNUT The woody fruit of the eucalyptus
LOCKNUT A nut which prevents another nut from loosening
NUMBNUT An idiot
PILINUT Tropical nut tree with compound leaves
THUMBNUT A nut that is turned by the thumb and fingers
WALNUT Either the tree or its nut
WINGNUT A nut with projections making it easier to be grasped
If you want to play any of these words against me all I can say is “Go Nuts”
Happy Scrabbling
Patrick