Hello: I am a big fan of natural peanut butter due to the low sugar content, but a big problem is of course all of the oil staying on the top and the bottom half drying out. Stirring only exacerbates the problem as it leaves the oil entirely dispersed in the first half so that when you get to the bottom half there is none left. Much better to dig deeply to get to areas you know are already light in oil so that you take it out on a more even basis instead of consistently drawing from the top, but still the last quarter or so still has a lack of oil.
If I were to put a little bit of peanut oil into that last quarter and stir, should it regain the consistency of the peanut butter over it? Or is there something about peanut oil that will leave the peanut butter with a funky taste?
jjimm, that’s too messy, as if I stir it when I have any oil left I usually spill some of it which is counterproductive.
I don’t know if peanut oil is has been altered at all, but I will try adding some to the last quarter of my natural PB: at the rate I use it it will only be left mixed together for a couple days at the most.
Oh, also jjimm,
. I wouldn’t worry about that. It can’t increase its caloric content all that much unless you add like %25 of the remaining peanut butter worth. I mean it will, but not by a lot.
My reasoning on that is: look at the difference in calories between natural peanut butter and regular kind. Yup, natural has more calories. i.e. the fat content of PB is so high naturally that the caloric content is reduced by adding pure sugar!
Do you store your unopened peanut butter upside down? If you do that, when you open it, the oil will be on the bottom of the jar, making it easier to stir all of it.
FWIW, there’s probably grades of peanut oil akin to olive oil. The stuff that rises to the top of the peanut butter is a fairly dark amber (the peanut version of extra-virgin, perhaps) and the bottled peanut oil I’ve got is a far paler yellow. Not sure if that means bottled peanut iol is heavily filtered, or if there’s a difference between peanut oil and peanut butter oil.
If you don’t have peanut oil handy, you should be fine using a bit of vegetable oil to loosen up the bottom of the jar.
They should package it in a sturdy plastic pouch with a threaded cap (kind of like a hot water bottle), so you can knead the entire preparation to a fully homogeneous state each time you want to use it.
It should also be able to stand up to some kind of washing process, so it can be refilled right at the food mill.
Natural peanut butter is easier to stir when warm. That is–room temperature in Houston, Texas. (Even with air conditioning.) Cooler temperatures make the un-oily bit cementlike.
Maybe you could, when you first open the jar, pour off the excess oil and save it. Then as you use the PB, gradually add a little more oil each time. You might even get by with not using all the oil, which would save a few calories.
Hey, can I stir-fry using the oil from my natural peanut butter?
I also like the upside-down method, except I don’t usually have unopened PB lying around long enough to make a difference.
If I could find a way to skim it off cleanly I just might try that. The top layers are overly oily as it is, no matter how much I stir (and stirring mixes the oil on the top layer, so that the top layer is very oily, whereas if I simply scoop it out I can wait for most of the oil to fall off of the scoop I just scooped.)
I’ve been wondering that, too! Except I never get a chance to try it, as I rarely cook something myself.
When I stir my all natural peanut butter, I create a homogeneous mass. You can’t tell the top from the bottom. If it has separated again between uses, I restir it.
That first stir is not fun; I’ll grant you that. I’m always glad when the wife has taken the initiative. But, with a little patience, and a slow start to prevent oil overflows, you’ll get it all mixed properly and evenly.
My problem is that after I open it & stir it, I store it in the refrigerator (I have cut back on my pb consumption so I need to store it). This makes subsequent stirrings much more difficult. Sometimes I’ll open the refrigerator door, look at it and decide I didn’t really want it that bad. (and IME it does separate in the refrigerator)
Store natural peanut butter upside down in pantry, then store in the fridge. I never have to do the big first stir that way. We ususally have many jars in the pantry at a time (my daughter loves the stuff so we stock up when it’s on sale). But even a fresh jar will be OK after an overnight upside down in the pantry. The oil stays mixed throughtout the PB, with maybe just a small amount on top early on.
Also, in case you didn’t know – peanut butter that is too hard to stir (or spread) gets softer after a couple of seconds (5-10) in the microwave. Just make sure you’ve removed every last bit of the foil seal on the jar, if there was one.