For True Peanut Butter Lovers : Walnut Acres, Penns Creek, Penn. 17862. (800) 433-3998. <i> Check, MasterCard, Visa, $3.50 postage and handling</i>

Elvis Presley loved peanut butter--he spread it on bread, added some bananas and then grilled them in butter. Chris Evert loves peanut butter too; she snacks on it before her tennis matches. William F. Buckley Jr. is also a peanut-butter fanatic; so is Dan Rather. The rest of us, on the other hand, average a paltry 3.3 pounds of peanut butter per year. That’s 800 million pounds of peanut butter consumed annually in America--enough to make 10 billion peanut-butter sandwiches.

Why this passion for peanut butter? It’s good for you. It’s cheap. And it tastes great. Besides, most of us grew up eating the stuff and think of it as comfort food.

While most peanut butter is good, I’ve discovered one that is great. It comes from Walnut Acres, a 500-acre organic farm that has specialized in unchemicalized foods since 1946. There’s no secret ingredient in their peanut butter: It is just peanuts and perhaps a little salt. But most peanut butters are made from low-grade peanuts that are blanched and de-germinated; at Walnut Acres only grade “A No.1” Spanish seed peanuts are roasted. Then, with the skin still on and the germ intact, the peanuts are ground daily in small batches.

Packed in classy jars, this chemical-free peanut butter is available in four varieties: smooth or chunky, and salted or unsalted. A one-pound jar costs $4.29, plus postage. Be forewarned: This peanut butter is so delicious you are almost guaranteed to double your annual allotment.