Homemade Nut Spread

Ingredients:

• 3/4 cup raw, unsalted nuts of your choice
• 3 grinds (or 1 medium-sized pinch) coarse sea salt

Instructions:

• Put all of the ingredients in a food processor.
• Pulse the mixture 10 times (to break the large nuts into a coarse meal).
• Begin processing the mixture in 10-20 second intervals.  (I.e., hold down the “chop” or “grind” button of your food processor for 10-20 seconds at a time, then take a 10-20 second break to allow the machine to cool down a bit.  [Doing this should prevent the motor of the food processor from burning out.  {Hopefully.}])
• Process the mixture a total of 5-7 minutes, or until the nuts reach a blended consistency to your liking.
• Done!  Use immediately, or store in the refrigerator for future use.

Makes 7 Tablespoons (4 ounces/113 g).

Nutritional information per 1 Tablespoon (16 g): 100 calories, 8 g fat, 3 g carbohydrate, 1 g fiber, 0.5 g sugar, 3.5 g protein.

What I started with.

Halfway through the process…

What I ended up with.

The ratings:

Mental Cost (ingredient availability): Could not be lower.
Financial Cost (ingredient cost): Up to you.  Peanuts are cheap; other nuts can be more expensive.
Emotional Cost (cooking skill level): Got a finger?  (Or an elbow?)  Then you can make this recipe.  :)  [I.e., Incredibly low.]
Time Cost (recipe preparation): Pretty darn low.
Life Cost (clean up time/effort): Low, low, low.
Worth It? (rate from 1-5): 4.01 – but the cool factor totally bumps this up to at least a 4.789.  ;)

Miscellaneous suggestions, insights, and/or thoughts:

• If you don’t have easy access to raw nuts, you can use roasted ones.  If you use salted nuts, omit the additional salt the recipe calls for.
• I used a combination of raw, unsalted peanuts, almonds, and cashews for my nut blend.  But next time, I think I’ll do equal quantities of just peanuts and almonds.  Or maybe toss in a few walnuts, too…
• I was aiming to make a smooth nut butter, but ended up with a texture and consistency that is more like nut grout.  The final product I created has a grit like fine sand.  While it’s not the result I had in mind, I do kind of like it.  I suspect if I processed the nuts for a few more minutes, I probably could have gotten my spread closer to a store-purchased consistency – but I don’t think I could ever attain a true smooth texture with the hardware that I currently own.  Still, if you have a fantastic food processor or blender, you might be able to create a nice smooth butter.
• While my texture isn’t spot-on, I do like that I know exactly what is in this spread – and that it doesn’t have any junk in it like palm oil, extra sugar, preservatives, or any other craziness.
• If you have animals in your home, you may want to put them outside while you whip up a batch of this spread. (One of our little dogs was pretty concerned when he heard the loud, high-pitched whine of the food processor continue for 20 seconds at a time.)
• I think it would be fun to experiment with flavored spreads next.  (Like adding honey, white chocolate, dark chocolate, cinnamon…You get the idea.)  And the additional ingredients might help the spread get to a smoother state, more like a real blended butter… Who knows?

Stef