Maybe it depends upon the nut.  Raw hazelnuts with skin intact taste  quite 
sweet to me -- not bitter.  Or perhaps Aboriginals have weak  digestion.  
Allergic reactions and choking aside, I've yet to hear of  death by raw 
hazelnut. In any event, I don't plan on doing or not doing  something based upon 
what the Aboriginals do or did.  Also, if I had such  trouble with a 
particular food that I had to go through all sorts of special  preparations such as 
soaking, drying, in order to tolerate it or to make it  palatable -- I 
probably wouldn't bother because I have a robust lazy  streak. As for raw 
hazelnuts or any other commonly eaten tree nut  such being toxic or poisonous 
unless soaked, dried etc -- people would be  dropping dead right and left of nut 
poisoning. 
 

 
 
In a message dated 6/5/2012 2:52:37 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
[log in to unmask] writes:

Many  Aboriginals knew  the bad effects of eating unsoaked nuts.  It was  
the custom to  find a tree bough overhanging a fast moving stream from  which 
they would  lash and suspend  a bag filled with gathered  nuts.  They would 
come back for the bag in  3 days.   The constantly moving waters would wash 
away the phytates, or  "bitterness".  The soaked nuts would then be laid 
out to dry in the  sun,  a primitive form of roasting.  Pretty ingenious if 
you ask  me.    

Batsheva


________________________________
From:  Adrienne Smith <[log in to unmask]>
I eat lots of raw hazelnuts with  the skin intact.  The skins contains  
most 
of the beneficial  proanthocyanidin (polyphenols).  There are  also 
benefits 
to  phytic acid.  If raw nuts agree with your digestion  and you have no  
allergies -- enjoy em I say.