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| From roasted peanuts to peanut butter right in my mini food processor! |
Wow. I've known I could do this for a long time. I just had no idea it was so easy and would come out so well.
**While this isn't a food blog, I enjoy cooking and baking and have decided to occasionally share a few of the best recipes I come across while living overseas. Hopefully they will be helpful or give you an excuse to try something new.**
Here's the scoop.
Peanut butter is expensive in Thailand. Although I'm sure its price is increasing all over, $6 US just seemed like too much for a small jar. Every once in a while I would find it on sale or just buy some anyways, but in general, I have gotten used to not eating it. And that's okay with me.
However, with my new-found revelation, the peanut butter option may be back.
The problem has never been a lack of peanuts. One of Thailand's most popular dishes, Som Tam (papaya salad), includes roasted peanuts. Which is how I ended up with a bag of peanuts in my cupboard. A few days ago, my friends helped me make papaya salad. It was great, and the leftover ingredients turned out to be great too.
So this morning. I pulled out the bag of peanuts. It was probably about 3/4 of a cup. I tossed them into my mini food processor and pushed GO. Then I thought I "might should" (as my southern friends would say) look at a recipe. (Side note, I'm not just learning Thai in Thailand, my team is also teaching me "Southern" English.)
Okay, back to looking at the recipe, well actually, recipes. One said I needed to add salt, honey, and oil. Another said don't add anything. I picked the one that suggested adding what you think it needs, but included that extra oil is unnecessary because the oil from the peanuts comes out as you process them. I decided to add some salt and kept blending.
The peanuts went through a few stages. Big chunks, little chunks, dusty particles, dust clumping together in a ball, ball getting wet, paste. At this point I tasted it and decided I should have added less salt. So I added some sugar and kept blending. The paste went from chunky peanut butter to smooth peanut butter after another minute or so.
Another taste test confirmed that I should have done this peanut butter thing a long time ago. It was amazing.
Then I had an idea to make it more amazing. I scooped out about half of the peanut butter, just in case my idea didn't work as planned. Then I sprinkled some chocolate chips into the food processor with the remaining peanut butter and blended some more.
Yep. You guessed it. Chocolate peanut butter. Why I reserved some of the first batch, I don't know. How could you go wrong with chocolate peanut butter??? It was even more amazing than the original.
I have a feeling the peanut guy at the market will be seeing me more often now, and not just when we are making Som Tam. Even if you can buy peanut butter at the store, I suggest trying this. It is so incredibly easy and so incredibly good. Not to mention, it's a lot of fun too.
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Recipe:
Homemade Peanut Butter
Ingredients:
Roasted Peanuts, about 1 cup or as much as you want to make/your food processor can hold
Salt, about 1/4 teaspoon depending on your taste and preference (you can always add more, but you can't take it out)
Optional: sugar, chocolate chips, or other creative ingredients
Instructions:
Place roasted peanuts and salt in food processor. Process on medium-high for 3-5 minutes, scraping the edges to combine peanuts evenly every 30 seconds. Taste peanut butter and add more salt or sugar if necessary. A longer processing time will result in more creamy peanut butter. When the desired consistency has been reached, add chocolate chips or other flavoring if desired and process until combined.
For creamy peanut butter with chunks (something like store-bought chunky peanut butter but SO much better), reserve 1/4 cup peanuts after the first 30 seconds to a minute of processing. Continue processing remaining peanuts until smooth. When the desired consistency has been reached, add the reserved peanut chunks and process a few more seconds until just combined.
Store peanut butter in an air-tight container in the refrigerator or cupboard, but it will stay fresh longer in the refrigerator. Peanut butter will solidify more after processing and even more in the refrigerator, as the oil from the peanuts cools.
