You guys know I’m a peanut butter lover for life. I mean whoever thought of grinding a nut into a magical spread is a FREAKING genius!
I literally slather peanut butter on everything in sight. I dream about it. I also wake up with peanut butter sandwiches next to my bed.
Yeah, don’t even ask.
Know what else I’m head over heels in love with? Homemade almond butter! It’s ridiculously smooth and perfect on muffins, pancakes, and in chickpea blondies. After making this vanilla bean honey almond butter, I just don’t know if I can go back to the plain PB.
Almond butter is packed with nutritional benefits too; this includes fiber, protein, and good-for-you fats. I’m not sure about you, but I kind of want to dive face first into the jar.
Anyway if you’ve never made homemade almond butter, now is the perfect time to start!
There are a few easy steps:
- Roasting the almonds in the oven to bring out the nuttiness
- Processing the almonds in a food processor (sorry, no blenders).
- Waiting a long time/wondering if it’s ever going to turn into anything (it will!).
- Adding additional flavors that you’d like once the almond butter is creamy.
Once your almonds are roasted, you can place them in your food processor and run it. After a minute or two, the almonds will look like sand (pictured above).
It’s very important to note that you should use a large food processor with a pretty strong motor as it will be running for a while. I recommend this food processor.
After about ten minutes of running the food processor, the almonds will release their oils and become clumpy. This might take more time to get to this point depending on your food processor. But don’t worry, it will happen!
Clumpy means delicious things are coming. All good things take time.
After several more minutes, the almond butter will smooth out. At this point, you can be the judge of how creamy you like your almond butter. I like my almond butter VERY creamy, so I usually continue to run my food processor until the almonds are blended until an almost liquid-like consistency.
This is also when you’d want to add any additional flavorings. I love vanilla bean, a pinch of sea salt, and a bit of honey. However, you could add in chocolate chips, cinnamon, vanilla extract, maple syrup basically anything you can dream up.
After that you can place it in a mason jar or in a Tupperware and cover; either will work. You don’t have to store it in the fridge either. Just give it a quick stir before you use and it’ll be perfect.
All the picture below needs is sliced bananas and some mini chocolate chips. Oh and probably a fresh manicure (excuse my nail polish).
ENJOY THE NUT BUTTER!
More homemade nut butter recipes + recipes to use this nut butter:
10 Homemade Nut Butter Recipes You Need to Make
Flourless Paleo Chocolate Almond Butter Cookies
Breakfast Baked Sweet Potatoes with Almond Butter, Banana & Chia
Raspberry, Almond Butter & Banana Oatmeal Muffins
Almond Butter Chocolate Chip Protein Cookies
Ambitious Kitchen
Cookbook
125 Ridiculously Good For You, Sometimes Indulgent, and Absolutely Never Boring Recipes for Every Meal of the Day
Homemade Almond Butter with Vanilla Bean, Honey & Sea Salt
Ingredients
- 2 cups unsalted almonds
- 1 teaspoon honey
- 1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise and seeds scraped
- 1/4 teaspoon sea salt
- 1-2 tablespoons coconut oil, to help smooth
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
- On large baking sheet spread out almonds and roast in oven for 10-12 minutes until slightly brown. Be very careful not to burn the nuts.
- Transfer to your food processor and process for 10-15 minutes, scraping down the sides as necessary. At this point the almonds should start to clump together. Continue to process until you reach the desired consistency. I always process until my almond butter is liquid like.
- If desired add salt, vanilla bean seeds, and honey and process again for another minute. If not smooth or it gets clumpy, add in 1 tablespoon of coconut oil and process again!
- Transfer to tupperware or mason jar and store at room temperature or in fridge. If you store at room temp, simply give the almond butter a stir before you use it.
Genius! Can not wait to try this!
What a brilliant idea! Will be making my own very soon…
I can’t believe you’re cheating on PB! 🙂 Kidding!
I love making my nut butters flavored…with anything from vanilla to bourbon to maple to graham crackers or butterscotch chips. I love your honey/vanilla bean twist. I bet it’s so good!
I'm going to try this tomorrow after I read the instructions on how to use my food processor. Talk about intimidating.
I just started making my own nut butters with my vitamix a couple weeks ago. Since I'm new at it, I thought I overdid it with the blending bc it was thick and chunky (looked dry). I guess it was the opposite and I didn't process it enough. I did add agave and salt and loved the flavor. I definitely save money making my own 🙂 I will try adding different flavors as you recommended as well… sounds delicious!
Thank you for posting this. I’ve been making my own almond butter for a while, because I needed it and the stuff at the natural food store was both unappetizing looking and very expensive. I just do it with plain raw almonds, and just love it that way. It is interesting to know that the roasted nuts take less time to turn into butter. I still need a little more patience when I make mine. 🙂 I do plain peanut butter also, it it turns out perfect in almost no time. Had I known how simple it is to do so, I probably would have started making nut butters a long time ago.
How long will this last? Looks so yummy!
Another wonderful idea! Can’t wait to try it! Coincidentally, I’m doing a Dr Oz- recommended Metabolism diet that includes nut butter in one of the three phases… perfect. 🙂
Ahhhh I love almond butter, this looks perfect (I adore the vanilla bean, honey, and sea salt additions!)
love love this!
Drool! I’ve only made almond butter once but I decided to keep it purely almonds which was totally delish but I am now convinced I haven’t lived till I’ve tried your version! And raw took soo long in my old food processor so I wonder how long roasted will take mine, and not to mention how runny yours gets, mine was pretty thick so annoying for spreading onto pan cakes!
I always do honey and sea salt. I will have to add vanilla next time!
Can’t even keep this stuff in my apartment because its so good!! This version looks out of this world!!!
I’ve never really been a fan of almond butter (it takes a lot to beat PB in my book) but this may be the exception…And it looks so easy!
I tried almond butter for the first time last summer and I must say I was not impressed. That said it wasn’t homemade and it certainly didn’t have the yummy honey or vanilla that yours does. I should give this a go since I have the same giant bag of costco almonds 🙂
George Washington Carver invented Peanut Butter. Good recipe!
Making this stuff this weekend. Seriously looks DIVINE!! love that you used vanilla bean paste! Miss ya girl!
This looks amazing!! I love homemade almond butter but have never added vanilla bean or honey – and definitely not sea salt. I’m trying this next. 🙂
I want to dive face first into your photos! I am seriously eye-balling the almonds I roasted earlier this week wondering if my fiance will notice if 2 cups go missing…
This looks really good, but I’m not a big almond fan. Think I could use Cashew instead?
Sure!
Just made this awesome almond butter in my Vitamix! No more store bought for me!
Do you think it’s okay to skip the roasting? The reason being that I read un-roasted nuts are more nutritious.
Love your recipes, by the way 🙂
Sure!
tubberware – lol!
Sad, I just tried to make almond butter yesterday and I ran and ran the food processor and it never turned to liquid 🙁 It’s just thick and…..pasty. Sad.
Hi Kat! You have to keep running it; sometimes it can take up to a half hour depending on the size and power of your food processor. Do you mind me asking what size and brand yours is?
Every single time I process my almonds, the butter NEVER becomes nice a liquids, it’s always so dry no matter how long I process them! I usually do 25-30 minutes, not sure why this happens!
Hmmm I am going to guess it’s based on the size of your processor and how powerful it is. I always use a 9 or 11 cup processor and I do have to run it for a while, too!
I used a Cuisinart 11cup food processor & it took me 5 minutes to get to runny. I don’t know if it took so short of time because of the processor or the almonds I used. I took organic raw almonds, then I soak them in salt water for 7 hours to get rid of the enzyme inhibitors (present in all nuts) so you can digest them better (see “Nourishing Traditions” by Sally Fallon or http://www.WestonAPrice.org). Then I dehydrate the almonds to dry them (can be done in oven at absolute lowest temperature -i.e. not even up to the lowest temp reading on oven. If oven reads higher than 150 degrees on oven thermometer, you can leave oven door ajar to keep it a little cooler. If higher temp than that you kill vital nutrients. That being said, I don’t know if that attributed to the short processing time. Another note: I added the salt & vanilla bean seeds & then blended briefly before adding the honey. Honey thickens nut butters – a lot! So I wanted the salt & vanilla mixed in before I added the honey. That way it is mixed in well before I stop processing as the nut butter thickened (which it did do – I processed until it got back to the thickness I wanted – which was not very thick, as I like it a tad runny. If you like your nut butter thik, just keep processing after you add the honey & it will get real thick, or add more honey & process to get thick.
Question: Has anyone processed jars of nut butter to keep on pantry shelves or must they always be refrigerated. I plan to make several batches as family gifts.
P.S. I know the temptation to reply “can’t wait to try this,” but Dawn’s detailed comment is the only one that gives me confidence to dive into this recipe. : )
Hi Bev! Know that this recipe is delicious! 🙂 One of my favorites. You know I think these are probably fine if they are sealed for a month or so. 🙂
My reason for trying this recipe is because I have had thyroid cancer and in order to prepare for a diagnostic dose of radioactive iodine….I am required to go on a low iodine diet. I begin the diet tomorrow. I just made the almond butter with honey, vanilla bean and non-iodized salt. IT IS WONDERFUL!!! I have a feeling I’ll be making more of this to enjoy when I’m NOT on the low iodine diet. This will be a treat on warm homemade bread (also required for the diet)! Thank you for sharing!
Would this work with tonka beans instead of vanilla? I’m trying to find a recipe to incorporate the tonka bean in to 🙂
I love it!! Brilliant flavor combo! I was frustrated at the almond butter prices lately and decided to try making it at home. The only problem is I wanted to eat the whole jar! Thanks for the great recipe. Can’t wait to try other combinations.
After adding honey, salt and vanilla- mine went all hard and clumpy again…Any thoughts?
I wanted this to work so badly. I tried soaking and dehydrating the almonds first, as one poster recommended per Nourishing Traditions, but after an hour and a half of processing AND adding raw almond oil to coax it along all I ended up with was a kind of oily almond dough (albeit tasty). Going to try again with non-dehydrated almonds next time. Any recommendations from people who have successfully made this are welcome, I know it’ll be delicious once I succeed in making it.
just keep blending…it seems to go through phases
nice
It makes it turn into a non-Newtonian fluid. Think water mixed with corn-flour (we call it maizena). Myth busters once made a bath full of it. If you walk quickly enough it turns solid and you can walk straight over it. But when moving slowly it is a liquid. So funny. But maybe less so for almond butter.
Mine was kind of hard? Should I keep blending it?
Finally made this and all I can say is YUM. Trying not to eat it by the spoonful. 🙂
I have organic almonds and make almond milk, after squeezing out the milk using a jelly strainer I dry the almond meal in the oven on parchment paper. I don’t yet know what to do with the dried almond meal perhaps some of your readers have idea, they are not blanched!I’ll have to figure it out soon as I’m running out of room in the freezer!! I am going to make the almond butter today. I prefer almond butter as I know that peanut butter is highter in fat and I just like the almond butter taste better. I used to make peanut butter, (in a blender, as that’s all I had at the time) when my now 45 year old was a boy. I plan to make almond butter cookies when this process is finished using the same recipe as peanut butter cookies. I really will have to be patient when running my food processor, as I have to hold the button down or else it won’t run! ~Thank you for the info.~Anna
How long will this stay good at room temp?
Why no blenders? I did this in my Vitamix and it came out just fine.
I have a quisinart. I kinda worry Id burn out its motor, but this sounds lovely. Id noted this was in the Paleo section. Id also looked at the other recipes there and am glad that they’re vegan! I associate paleo with lots of flesh food, and for this reason, am put off; and as well as by the low levels of starch, which I eat of lot of( whole food starchy fare of course)
Hello,
was wondering if you can tell me why the mixture becomes grainy again after i added the honey? it was already creamy before the addition of the honey. Help!!
I’m in need of a new food processor to make all theses great food recipes. Any recommendations that won’t break the bank?
Crate & Barrel and Williams-Sonoma have some great options! I like to use Cuisinart 🙂
Any nut butter is my ADDICTION. Almond butter, peanut butter, hazelnut butter, cashew butter, and seed butters are glorious. I really want to ace making my own. I’ve only tried a few times and they weren’t that successful!
SAME. Love all of it. Be sure you blend it up enough (and add a bit of coconut oil if it’s not smoothing out!)
Hi- I’m trying to make this but it has turned out fudgy. I have added the coconut oil to help but has not gotten creamy. Any suggestions?
It sounds like you need to process the almond butter longer. Often times this can take up to 20 minutes in the food processor!
Game changer! I love the Rx Nut butter but hate the price tag!
I’m in the middle of a Whole 30 and I’m sick of eggs in the morning so I thought some fruit with almond butter would do the trick so I tried my hand at making this! AMAZING!
I omitted the honey to make it compliant and used regular vanilla bc I had it on hand. My kids & I devoured this & I’m making another batch today to take to a friend!
Thanks for the recipe!
You found the perfect recipe! Such a great snack. Glad everyone loved this one!
After my favorite vanilla almond butter was discontinued, I needed to find a recipe to make my own. I use a Vitamix and followed Monique’s recipe directions. I used the seeds of 4 beans (put the bean carcasses in a jar of vodka and make your own vanilla!), added a dollop of honey, 1 tbls of coconut oil and salt. This butter is REALLY easy and very good!
2 cups of almonds gives me a small mason jar of butter. I can’t say how long it lasts because everyone eats it and the jar is gone within a few days.
Thanks for posting this, Monique!
Amazing! Such a great alternative to store bought 🙂
I have a question could you share which food processor you recommend? The link on Amazon just says uh oh.
Yes! This is the one 🙂
Hi Monique, I LOVE this recipe—been using it for literally years!) Before I tried your recipe, I did not like almond butter. Now, I eat it almost everyday. The only problem is everyone else loves it too; so, now, I have to hide some for me! My question is about the almonds. I usually use fresh, unroasted almonds. Right now, I have about 4 pounds of sliced almonds (unblanched,, a.k.a. skins on). Is it okay to make this recipe with the sliced almonds? I am afraid of ruining the recipe. [I reckon they will blend faster since they are sliced up already and so thin?]. Thanks, Janice
Hi Janice! So glad you’re loving this recipe! Yes, feel free to use sliced almonds 🙂