Homemade Peanut Butter

Peanut, Peanut Butter and Jelly! Peanut, Peanut Butter and Jelly! How many of you sang that? I don’t know about you, but I have fond childhood memories of, not only the peanut butter and jelly song but the beloved lunchbox staple itself. An ooey gooey peanut butter and grape jelly sandwich was in the lunch of every elementary school friend. It was cheap, it was hardy, and it fed us protein, carbs, and something resembling fruit! Perfect!

Fast forward to adulthood and while I haven’t had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for, well, probably decades, I still love peanut butter! I love eating it on apples or bananas, or simply by the spoonful. It’s filling and satisfying. I will admit, though, I am a creamy peanut butter girl through and through. There is something just not right about crunchy peanut butter. I feel like someone left the egg shell in the scrambled eggs when I eat crunchy peanut butter. Yuck!

Personal preferences aside, peanut butter can be not only delicious, but nutritious! But…..have you ever looked at the ingredients in your store bought peanut butter? My go to brand, which I won’t mention any names, starts off well enough…roasted peanuts, sugar (not great but whatever), but then starts into fully hydrogenated vegetable oils (rapeseed and soybean) and then finally mono and diglycerides. Hmmmm…. First, what in the world is rapeseed??? I’m glad you asked! It’s a “vegetable oil” derived from the rapeseed plant and is more commonly known as canola oil. The interesting part, though, is that there is an industrial form of rapeseed oil that is high in euric acid and used in chemical and automotive industries. While canola oil is low in euric acid (supposedly) it still isn’t something I want to take a chance with, if you know what I mean. So besides the sketchy oils, we are trying to stay away from ingredients we can’t pronounce or that don’t come from nature…so bye-bye mono and diglycerides.

Hello homemade peanut butter! So when I tell you, this is the easiest thing I have ever made, I am not exaggerating. It is so simple and so quick and mostly hands off. What!?!? Now, I have made this enough times to perfect it for me, but the nice part about this recipe is that you can tweak it to your taste. I like a nice mix of salty and sweet but you can make it however you want. You can add things like cinnamon or a bit of cocoa powder, whatever kind of sweetener you prefer, if you want it sweet at all! Brilliant!

So here is the recipe. I actually giggled when I saw it because I thought it had to be more complicated than what I was seeing but, it’s not! Also, please read my “notes” section at the end of the recipe for what I have found works and a few helpful hints.

HOMEMADE PEANUT BUTTER RECIPE

Equipment:

Ingredients:

16 ounce jar of peanuts
Salt to taste
Honey or other preferred sweetener to taste
Avocado oil (if using honey) I will explain below

Directions:

Preheat oven to 250̊. On a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, spread peanuts in an even layer and bake in the oven for about 20 minutes or until darker and fragrant. Allow to cool until they can be handled.

Add roasted peanuts to your food processor. Process for 3-5 minutes until peanuts become creamy. Add salt (starting with a small amount and adding to taste) and honey (or preferred sweetener, again starting with a smaller amount and adding as needed) and process again to incorporate. If you are using honey, you will need to add a bit of oil to keep it creamier.

Once at the desired taste and consistency, pour into a 16 ounce jar with a lid and refrigerate.

Enjoy!

A few notes:

I prefer to use unsalted peanuts for 2 reasons: one, you are just getting straight peanuts…no added oils, and two, then I can add my own salt to my taste.
When using honey as the sweetener, it will actually make the peanut butter stiffer, so you will have to add some kind of oil to add moisture back in. I use avocado oil but any light tasting oil is fine.
You don’t HAVE to toast your nuts first. I have done it both ways, but let me assure you, it is totally the way to go! The flavor is so much better when the nuts are toasted first.
Trust the process! When I first made it, I rushed and didn’t let the peanuts break down the whole way. Be patient! Let the food processor do its job!
Before using, you may want to take it out of the fridge to warm up and soften. Remember, we aren’t using any preservatives here so it’s not going to look exactly like the store brands.

Well, there you have it folks! The easiest, best, and healthiest homemade peanut butter! I make this just about every other week. I am the only one that eats it, but it’s so good I eat it almost every day with a banana as my mid-morning snack. I hope you will enjoy it as much as I do!

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