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I wasn’t sure if creating a blogpost for this recipe would be an insult to my website and to my audience. To me, something that has at least three ingredients can then and only then be justified to be called a recipe. But stepping out of my bubble, I discover the perception that ANYTHING made at home – even using a singular ingredient – is a DIY triumph.

I must confess that making my own nut butters have only been a very recent addition to my self-subsistent practices. A couple of years ago, when a friend Azzy told me she makes her own tahini for hummus, I told her to shut the front door. I’ve scratched tahini off my shopping lists ever since.

When my husband started to like peanut butter (when I first met him he hated the stuff), he would easily go through an entire jar before the month was up. Seeing how many eco-unfriendly jars and containers this was amounting to, I began making peanut butter myself.

The challenge was (and still is!) removing the skins off raw peanuts after roasting. I do it by hand, one by one. I have asked some old timers if they knew of an easier way to remove peanut skins, and they have said no. I now approach it as a meditative process.

Thankfully, my regular bulk store The Hive has now introduced raw SKINLESS!!! peanuts to its inventory.

I’ve been told once before that some factories apply some kind of chemical to remove the skins. How much truth there is to this, I’m not too sure. If you want to play really safe in terms of choosing less processed products, skinning them yourself is the way to go.

I prefer roasting the nuts myself. This puts me in control of one extra step, and freshly roasted nuts bring out the best taste. If you don’t have an oven, you can purchase skinned pre-roasted nuts. However, if purchasing from a supermarket, it’s hard to tell how long they’ve been sitting on the shelf for… and if so, what extra preservatives might have been added to keep them fresh. If no preservatives have been added, the nuts might taste old too. There are some pasar malam / pasar pagi (night / morning street markets) in Malaysia that sell freshly roasted nuts in small batches. Make sure you get a taste test before buying.

In terms of oil, my go-to is coconut or rice bran. Any other neutral-tasting cooking oil would work too. This is another plus point in making your own nut butter: most conventional nut butters in the market use partially hydrogenated palm oil.

Take note that this recipe is bare bones – as in, no sugar and no salt, for those who prefer it that way or their diet requires it to be so. However, feel free to add your own salt and sweetener if you wish. I’ve included it in the recipe as optional ingredients, and you can adjust these measurements to your liking.

It’s also for SMOOTH peanut butter only. If you wish to make it chunky, you can add in pre-made peanut chunks that you can easily buy at most baking stores.

You will need a blending appliance – a food processor is most ideal. If you have a milling attachment for your blender, you can use that too. For my milling attachment, I accommodate to the smaller size with 150 grams peanuts – which comes up to one full cup – and blending that with 1/4 cup of oil.

It’s best that you keep your peanut butter in the fridge so that it keeps for longer – I’ve kept my peanut butter out for less than a week and it already started tasting old thanks to the hot Malaysian weather. The butter will harden a little when cold because of the oil. It’s not going to be impossible to use, but leaving it out of the fridge for 10-15 minutes before dipping in your knife / spoon / finger will give you a gooier texture.

If you’re allergic to nuts, you can use exactly the same recipe and replace the peanuts with sunflower seeds!

Enjoy your homemade peanut butter, which is also perfect with a ribbon around the lid as a gift to friends… if you can bear the thought of parting with it.

Peanut Butter

May 16, 2019

Prep: 35 min

Cook: 25 min

Total: 1 hr

Difficulty: Easy

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The easiest. healthiest peanut butter you could possibly make!

By: Davina Da Vegan

Ingredients

• 200g raw peanuts, skins removed
• 1/3 cup cooking oil
• 1.5 - 2 tbsp brown sugar or any other sweetener (Optional)
• 1/2 tsp pink Himalayan salt (Optional)

Directions

• Step 1 Roast peanuts at 180 degrees Celsius for 25 mins, stirring the nuts every 8-10 minutes.
• Step 2 After roasting, remove peanuts from oven and allow to cool for 30 minutes.
• Step 3 Place all ingredients in a food processer and blend until smooth. If the blending process needs a bit of help, add in more oil, 1 tablespoon at a time, until the right consistency is achieved. You typically won’t need to exceed 3 extra tablespoons.
• Step 4 Transfer butter to a jar.
• Step 5 Can be eaten immediately or stored in the fridge for later consumption.