I’m mighty tempted to buy a peanut butter grinder. I got into the habit last year of nibbling peanut butter along with my morning apple. I know, weird.
The second ingredient in all of the more affordable peanut butter is sugar. So, I consider grinding my own. I’ve found this grinder made for the purpose and it seems a reasonable price, if it works as advertised.
Does anyone grind their own here? Traps? Tricks? I plan to refrigerate it after making a jar of it. Sourcing roasted peanuts may not be that difficult. I live in Queens, New York City. Enough stores catering to various ethnicities that make use of roasted whole peanuts for cooking on a daily or near-daily basis that I suspect in a drive of 20 minutes or less I’ll be in a grocery where I can get large bags of the nuts.
What’s the downside? Any reason I shouldn’t go this route? Yeah, I eat plenty of stuff with sugar- but am trying to cut down. This is a daily intake of sugar that I can beat unless there’s a compelling reason not to try grinding my own.
Why not make sugar free peanut butter. There is way too much sugar in commercial peanut butters.
Or just buy a minimal sugar added peanut butter from Costco like I do, two huge jars for about $12 is a steal for this stuff. Two jars last me about 6 months. Once you mix it up you put it in the fridge and it doesn’t separate back into an oily mess.
When I was a kid, I had a hand-cranked “Mr Peanut” peanut butter grinder. I never had any problem with the taste of the peanut butter, but I recall cleaning the grinder was a pain.
We only ever made small batches though, so a large batch might be different.
Our neighbor sells peanut butter in her farm store. It separates but that’s easy to deal with. She makes versions that are fully sugared, sugar free, and my favorite honey peanut butter.
Our African Grey, Rocco, will do anything if you promise him peanut butter.
I roast 1kg of shelled peanuts and while they are still warm I put them in my food prosessor with a tablespoon of salt. Grind away until smooth and before the oil starts to separate. That’s the finesse of the whole thing, one must know when to stop.
Additional reasons could be the particular variety of peanuts, and the degree/method of roasting.
I have read that popcorn and potato chip producers use very specific varieties of corn and potatoes. You can’t just go into a grocery for some corn-on-the-cob or Idaho potatoes, expecting the homemade popcorn and chips to taste great. I presume that same goes for peanut butter too.
Or maybe you CAN use any peanuts. I’m just suggesting some potential problems.
I get why one would do that, practically speaking. Just saying I don’t think I would like to eat cold peanut butter. The few times I’ve gotten it ground at the grocery store, I would have to stir it up each time before use (also not very appealing). I guess if I was spreading it on toast it wouldn’t be an issue.
I’m not going to try to talk you out of grinding your own, but there are a ton of low cost peanut butter options that just salt and peanuts. My wife buys the Trader Joe’s brand, which off the top of my head is something like $2.99 for one pound. My local store brand is that cheap or cheaper for the ‘natural’ stuff which again, is just salt and peanuts. Generally, she gets it home, stirs it like a fiend (because it will separate), and then refrigerates it which keeps it together for as long as it lasts.
I don’t honestly think I could make it cheaper, but if I was, I’d suggest getting a good $100-150US food processor rather than a single use dedicated grinder. It’ll do the job just as well, probably be easier to clean, and can do more if you decide making it yourself is too much hassle.
Oh, and for what it’s worth, a great reason to make your own is not only customizing the sugar (if any), and salt (if any), you avoid a heck of a lot of plastic waste. My wife cleans and saves the plastic jars (booo) and uses them for small item organization at home and work (normally screws and little ‘fiddly’ bits).
I don’t eat a lot of peanut butter but when I do it’s the natural style stuff, usually Adams crunchy. If you leave it out for a long time, not only does the oil separate but it can also go rancid and that’s nasty. So I leave the jar in the fridge and when I want some I take off the lid and stick the whole jar into the microwave for a minute and voila, perfectly soft and spreadable peanut butter. Easy peasy.
I don’t know how people eat the sugar/fat added peanut butter, that stuff is gagalicious. Peanut butter is peanuts and salt, NOTHING ELSE.
I second Ike_Witt!
Popular brands such as Skippy, Kraft etc. are not peanut butter. They are to peanut butter what Wonder is to bread. Check the ingredients. If there’s more than 1 item in the list (that being peanuts), it’s not peanut butter.
Refrigerate after mixing.