You know how we all have random childhood memories? The kind of memories that didn’t particularly alter the course of your life but tend to pop into your head unprovoked. Like the time your younger sister convinced you to let her take a ride on your new bike and she took off and crashed into a tree denting up your birthday gift or… the time you locked yourself out of the house and had to wait outside 2 hours after school until your mom got home from work.
Well…don’t judge me, but one of my random childhood memories involves Nutella. Yes, Nutella. I fondly remember traveling to Europe as a child and being allowed to indulge in the smooth, chocolatey spread on a fresh slice of baguette bread. See? I told you it was random! mmmmmm
This spread has since come to North America and well…as with most things, the ingredients have changed to include cheap oils. I was shocked the other day (I don’t watch a lot of TV so this may be old news to some of y’all), to see a commercial for Nutella that included a Dr./Mom endorsing it as a healthy start to a child’s day! WHAT?
INGREDIENTS: SUGAR, PALM OIL, HAZELNUTS, COCOA, SKIM MILK, REDUCED MINERALS WHEY (MILK), LECITHIN AS EMULSIFIER (SOY), VANILLIN: AN ARTIFICIAL FLAVOR.
This little spread contains a lot of sugar! 21 grams per 2 tbsp serving to be exact! Not to mention palm oil, skim milk, whey, soy and and vanillin! A healthy start to the day my a**! I obviously won’t buy Nutella, but on occasion I would like to spread a little something chocolately on my slice of sourdough bread dammit! I’m also never one to give up so I’ve got a delicious recipe for homemade almond butter done 3 ways: regular, cinnamon honey and chocolate…take your pick!
Almond Butter
Toss 2 cups of almonds in the bowl of your food processor. I always use my raw, soaked, dehydrated nuts to increase digestability. Why soak and dehydrate your nuts? Click here
These need to be twirled around in your food processor for about 10 minutes on high, longer on low. To protect the rawness of the nuts, I run it in short increments, let it cool, then run it again.
At this point it’ll look like a fine meal.
Now it’ll start to clump together. Stick with it.
It’s starting to look a little more like a spread. Almost there. A bit more patience.
This is perfect! You’ll be able to tell once the oils have released from the almonds because it becomes a lot more fluid and you can actually see the oils in the butter.
Give yourself a high five because you’ve just made your very own almond butter! woot! No more store bought for you. You can totally enjoy this straight up or choose your own adventure:
Honey Cinnamon
To your food processor add:
2-3 tbsp honey
1 tsp cinnamon
pinch of salt
Twirl around and voila!
Chocolate
To your food processor add:
2-3 tbsp honey
2 tbsp cacao powder
pinch of salt
1+ tbsp almond or coconut oil (enough to bring it back to a spreadable consistency as the cocoa powder thickens it slightly)
- 2 cups almond
- 2-3 tbsp honey
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 2 tbsp cacao powder (what's the difference between cacao and cocoa?
- pinch of sea salt
- 1+ tbsp almond or coconut oil
- 1. In a food processor add your 2 cups of almonds.
- 2. Run it intermittently for about 10 minutes on high.
- 3. The nuts will transition from chopped to a paste to sticky to butter like (check pictorial).
- 4. You can stop once the butter appears to have released it's oils (about 10 minutes).
- For ---> Honey Cinnamon Almond Butter
- Add honey and cinnamon and twirl around
- For ---> Chocolate Almond Butter
- Add honey, salt, cacao powder and as much oil as necessary to maintain to fluidity
