Homemade Peanut Butter
Peanut Butter-- delicious, great nutrition, and a great source of protein!
Since going vegetarian last year, peanut butter, one of my old favorites, has become one of my nutritional staples. Wife and I have also been eliminating as many processed foods from our diet as possible. Initially, we started buying all-natural peanut butter. No chemicals or preservatives, no trans-fats or added sugars, typically just peanuts and salt. Additionaly, we have been eliminating most disposable products and identifying/eliminating many sources of unnecessary containers.
So, this was a natural evolution. We are now making our own peanut butter. All we need are peanuts and a food processor. A small amount of salt and/or added oil are optional. We're using a little bit of peanut oil. It helps make the peanuts process a little easier, and makes the peanut butter a little smoother. For crunchy peanut butter, my favorite, just grind a few nuts separately, and stir them in at the end. Add a little honey for a sweeter variation.
It's just as tasty as the commercial product, is cheaper, and we have total control of the ingredients! Like commercial all-natural peanut butter, the oil separates a little in storage, so we stir it before use.
And we can store it in our own reuseable containers instead of adding more plastic jars to our recyling. Recyling plastic is great, and we will continue to recycle everything we can. But a practice even better than recyling is to avoid generation of recylables where possible. This avoids the consumption of resources that the container is made from, and saves the resources consumed in the container production process.
Green choices-- they are everywhere, if we just look for them! Many of them are so simple!
Think Green and Live Green!
