Organic peanut butter is probably quite good value at £3.50 for a 300g jar, which is just over £10 per kilo. Not bad but considering that most of us own a blender and organic peanuts can cost less than £3 per kilo we may be missing a trick!
Why stop at peanuts. Here’s an extremely simple recipe for a luxurious, healthy and tasty nut butter which can be spread, used in cooking, or my favourite; half a teaspoonful blended with half a cup of water for 20 seconds to make fresh milk for my cereal each morning.
You will need:
- A cupful of peanuts with their skins still on
- A handful of cashew nuts
- A handful of walnuts
- A tablespoonful of olive oil
- A half teaspoonful of Himalayan or Maldon salt
- A half teaspoonful of honey if you wish
Place the nuts together in a baking dish, and pop into a preheated oven at 180 for 20 minutes, no more! We don’t want them burnt, but just cooked through.
Empty into the blender, add the honey, salt and olive oil and blend until smooth. You need quite a good blender to do it in one hit so be prepared to keep spooning it back down to the blade as this mixture can get quite stiff. After a while something miraculous happens however; the nuts break down small enough that their oil is released and the whole thing becomes more malleable.
Once it feels smooth and creamy to the touch it is ready to go into a jar.
– Thommy (Food Hub Volunteer)