Almonds are the product of trees from the prunus genus. Though commonly referred to as a nut almonds are actually the seed of the drupe of these trees.
Almonds contain a large number of interesting organic compounds. Perhaps the best known of these is cyanide, an alkaloid which can be extracted from almonds and used for a number of purposes. While cyanide does come from almonds not all almonds produce cyanide. In fact the eating almond is the sweet almond which does not produce cynide. It is the bitter almonds which produce cyanide as the enzyme contained in the bitter almond seeds acts on other chemicals in the almond to produce cyanide aromatic compounds.