Monday, December 3, 2007

Homemade Almond Butter

It's as easy as 1..2...3...
All you need are raw almonds! For this recipe I used a 3 pound bag of almonds. ( hubby is an almond butter freak). But you can use as much as you like depending on how much you want. My cost was $9.79 for the bag at Costco. The jars shown are 16 oz. jars. So this worked out perfectly for me.

Did you know that almonds are one of the most nutritious of all nuts? It's true. One ounce of almonds contains 12 percent of your daily allowance of protein. And absolutely no cholesterol. You'll also get 35 percent of your daily allowance of vitamin E, the valuable antioxidant with so many cancer fighting qualities. And most of the fat in almonds is monounsaturated, also known as the "good" fat.
Almonds are also loaded with minerals like magnesium, phosphorus and zinc, as well as lots of healthy fiber. And don't forget calcium and folic acid! One study showed that three ounces of almonds a day actually lowered a person's cholesterol by 14 percent. Now how can you say no to this nutritious snack?

Well, enough bragging. Try it yourself and I'm sure you will agree that almond butter is the best!
Read below for step by step instructions.

First you will need to toast your almonds. I used a pie tin. You can also place them on a cookie sheet. This held about 2-1/2 cups of nuts. I put them in my toaster oven at 350 degrees F. for about 8-10 minutes stirring every couple of minutes or so so they toasted evenly. Then placed aside to cool.







The easiest way is with a food processor. Of course you can use a blender I suppose but I wouldn't recommend it. Imagine the clean up!











Turn your food processor on high. Slowly add handfuls at a time through the shoot. As it mixes it will make crumbs.











Pretty soon it will start to clump together.













Scrape down the sides every now and then.













After about 7 to 8 minutes you will have nice smooth almond butter. If you like your almond butter chunky add some crushed almonds and pulse a couple of times. That's it in a nutshell (pun intended) Store in a cool place or in the fridge. Enjoy!

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