Almond butter is one of those things I’ve been meaning to try for ages but just never got around to.  I did make my own peanut butter once, when I first got my Breville food processor, but I wasn’t very happy with it at the time.  I thought it would turn out nice and smooth, like commercial brands of peanut butter, but there were these tiny chunks of peanuts that just refused to blend in and make a smooth nut butter.  Maybe that’s just the way it is with homemade nut butters.  It was still quite good though and tasted much more peanutty than commercial brands.

I recently came across a recipe for chocolate almond butter from A Full Measure of Happiness that made me remember that I wanted to try making my own almond butter as well.  I’ve never tasted almond butter before, so at least I’d be able to taste this nut butter with a clean slate and no biases!

So, following the recipe, I roasted 2 cups of almonds and tossed them in my food processor along with 1/2 teaspoon of sea salt flakes.  Making your own nut butter this way will take about 10-15 minutes and the sides of the bowl will need to be scraped down a lot.  Once the almonds started coming close to the right consistency, I melted 1/3 cup of chopped Lindt 70% chocolate and added it to the nut butter.  A few minutes later, I got a little impatient as the mixture just wasn’t looking like the picture from A Full Measure of Happiness’ blog.  At about the 15 minute mark though, it finally started looking a bit more liquidy, so I let it go another minute or two and decided it was ready.

Doesn’t it look delicious!  It’s not very sweet, especially with having used dark chocolate, and I haven’t tried it on any other foods yet, but it’s great just for eating off the spoon!

Apparently, the nut butter should last up to 3 months in the refrigerator.  Although the cold temperature makes it more firm, it still remains spreadable straight from the refrigerator.  I’m sure you could warm it up in the microwave though if you’d rather have a softer texture.

For the recipe, and step-by-step photos, check out A Full Measure of Happiness (where you can also find the recipe for coconut almond butter!).

This dark chocolate almond with sea salt recipe from Eat Life Whole also look delicious – it uses cocoa powder, coconut oil and honey.

Not sure how to use almond butter?  You can use plain almond butter in place of many recipes that use peanut butter, such as this recipe for noodle stir fry with spicy almond butter sauce (check out Barney Butter‘s website for many more recipe ideas).  Make almond butter cookies, spread it on a slice of bread, or stir it into oatmeal.  Just search on Google and you’ll find heaps more ideas!

Do you make your own nut butters?  Which is your favorite?