Tag Archives: nuts

Mixed Fruit & Nut Butter

I love nut butter. Peanut butter, almond butter, mixed nuts, you name it. Just leave the coconut out and I am a happy girl.

There are a few standard jars that I like to have on hand, but lately I’m enjoying making my own nut butter. It’s fun and easy to make, and the taste from freshness is unbeatable. The best part is that when you do it yourself, there are so many ways you can customize the mix. Seasonings like salt, cinnamon and vanilla are basic additions to enhance the flavor of the nuts. Want to use peanuts or pecans, almonds or cashews? The selection is up to your discretion and there is no limit to how many you can use. While you are at it, why not add some mix-ins like raisins or chocolate chips?

I’ve seen a lot of nut butter inspiration on blogs:

Homemade Nut Butter (Perfect for a basic nut butter)

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Almond Butter (Cookie dough and almond butter in one? Yes, please!)

Pumpkin Spiced Almond Butter (I love the flavor of pumpkin all year round)

Cinnamon Vanilla Peanut Butter (Perfect spin on a classic)

4-Ingredient Dark Chocolate Almond Butter (I’ve made a variation of this, leaving out the oil, and it was delicious!)

Homemade White Chocolate Peanut Butter (Even for a white chocolate hater this looks heavenly)

This weekend I decided to make something different with what I had on hand, a Mixed Fruit and Nut Butter. Since I had 3 bags of nuts already open, I decided to combine them: Honey Roasted Peanuts, Roasted Almonds, and Roasted Cashews

Cashews Almonds Peanuts

I also wanted to add texture to the spread with some dried fruit. The dried blueberries and bing cherries add a wonderful chew and aren’t too sweet

Dried Cherries and Blueberries

The entire process took about 10 minutes from start to finish. Completely worth it!

Start by combining the nuts in a food processor for about 5 minutes; scrape the sides every minute or two

Nuts in food processor

When nuts are fully ground and the texture is drippy, add the cinnamon and salt if needed; run food processor for another 30 seconds

Making Nut Butter 1

Finally, add dried fruit and run through food processor for about 3 minutes or until the fruit is as small as you’d like (run for less time if you want bigger dried fruit chunks)

Making Nut Butter 2 Making Nut Butter 3

Store in a leftover nut butter jar or tupperware at room temperature for up to a month

Nut Butter 1

[print_this]

Mixed Fruit & Nut Butter

I didn’t t add any salt because the nuts I used were salted enough. The nut butter comes out to ~100 calories / tablespoon which is similar to most natural peanut butters.

Total Time: 10 minutes

Yield: 1 cup + 2 tablespoons

Serving Size: 1 tablespoon

Calories per serving: 100

Ingredients

  • 1 cup roasted cashews
  • 2/3 cup honey roasted peanuts
  • 1/2 cup roasted almonds
  • 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
  • up to 1 teaspoon salt to taste
  • 3 tablespoons dried bing cherries (unsweetened)
  • 1/4 cup dried blueberries (unsweetened)

Cooking Directions

  1. Start by combining the nuts in a food processor for about 5 minutes; scrape the sides every minute or two
  2. When nuts are fully ground and the texture is drippy, add the cinnamon and salt if needed; run food processor for another 30 seconds
  3. Finally, add dried fruit and run through food processor for about 3 minutes or until the fruit is as small as you’d like (run for less time if you want bigger dried fruit chunks)
  4. Store in a leftover nut butter jar or tupperware at room temperature for up to a month

[/print_this]

I have been eating the nut butter by the spoonful or spreading it on english muffins.  How would you eat homemade nut butter?

Showing Almond Butter Some Love

Bars are such an easy thing to make and serve. Rather than dropping dozens of cookies onto several baking sheets and switching pans in and out of the oven, you can spread the batter into one large pan and bake it in one batch. Once they are done and cool, you just slice and serve. Pieces can be as big or small as you want.

Since I have a ton of baking to do over the next month or so, I have found a few recipes that are less time consuming to mix in with the more complicated desserts. Besides, as it turns out, sometimes the easiest desserts are the most popular! I am really excited about the recipes I will be making over the next several weeks, and I think you will enjoy them as well. This recipe is a good start to the holiday baking season but can be used year round. I was excited when I found it because it uses almond butter as a main ingredient. I haven’t baked with almond butter before, I am more of a die-hard peanut butter lover, but I do enjoy it for variety. This Food &Wine cookbook actually has a ton of great recipes and this recipe for Chocolate Chunk Almond Butter Bars is one of the more simple that I found.

cookbook

For a change, I didn’t make any tweaks, and I don’t think it needs any. These crispy and chewy bars would be terrific with a glass of milk, but I’ll be serving them among a selection of many other desserts.

The details to the recipe can be found here.

For this recipe you will need a food processor and just a few ingredients

all ingredients

Side note: the hardest part of making these was getting my food processor down from the back corner of my top kitchen shelf

Chop your nuts and set aside

chopped almonds

 

Then mix up the dough in the food processor (you don’t need to clean it between these steps)

food processor 1

food processor 2

food processor 3

food processor 4

dough 1

Stir in chocolate chips (I used chunks) and chopped almonds.

dough 2

dough 3

Spread it out in your baking pan

dough 4

Bake

done 1

Crispy, chewy, delicious

done 3

done 2

Have you baked with almond butter before?