All you need are peanuts, honey, five minutes and this recipe to make your own delicious homemade peanut butter!

One of my favorite things to do is to experiment with making some of the things we usually buy in jars and cans and boxes at the supermarket.  The trick is, they have to be less of an effort than getting in the car, driving to the market, putting it in the cart, waiting in the checkout line and unloading it at home.  So far, the things I have figured out that are both faster and more delicious than that whole process include ricotta cheese, hummus and butter.  Pickles aren’t as fast (they do have to pickle themselves for a week or two) but they taste one million times better.  And now I can add peanut butter to this list!

Now, this is what I lovingly call the “rustic” version of peanut butter.  If you’ve ever bought fresh made peanut butter from one of those peanut butter making machines they have in fancy supermarkets, you know what I am talking about.  It’s not as totally smooth as your typical jar of Skippy, but the taste of it…oh my goodness, and if you really like as creamy as possible I do have a variation that can get you there – more on that below.  In the meantime, all you need are salted peanuts, a little honey and your handy dandy food processor.

Take a pound of peanuts and pop them in the food processor.  Press the start button and let it go…my peanut butter took about 5 minutes to go from peanuts to the peanut butter consistency you see in these pictures.  I stopped it a few times to scrape down the sides of the processor, but that was as much work as I put into it.

When it gets to the consistency you like, add a few tablespoons of honey.  If you are used to the taste of supermarket peanut butter, one of the things you are tasting is the sweetness of all the sugar they add to it, and I’m all for some sweet in my peanut butter…but I love the particular taste of honey, and I like to control the amount.  Depending on how salty your nuts were, you might also want to process in a little extra salt as well.  (By the way, I’ve heard that honey roasted peanuts make AMAZING peanut butter, which makes complete sense.  I haven’t tried that variety yet, but you know I will!) And last but not least, if you want to get a little bit closer to the creamy consistency, process in a little peanut or canola oil a teaspoon at a time.  I liked the rougher version of mine without the oil, but it’s all a matter of preference. Taste and adjust, taste and adjust.  I know, it’s a tough job, but someone’s gotta do it.

One last note on my whole peanut butter making adventure.  As usual, when it was done I needed to take its picture, and on that particular day there was some beautiful daylight coming in through the living room window.  So instead of shooting it in my little kitchen photography studio, I set things up right there on the living room floor.  The aroma of fresh peanut butter filled the air.  And all I can say is…what a Good Dog.

Looking/not looking.  Somebody got a dog cookie for being very well-behaved in the face of overwhelming temptation.

 

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