Carl's Almond Honey Butter

A few weeks ago, a Facebook status of particular interest caught my eye. "Made my own almond butter last night. Half the price of the premade stuff in stores! Fun project for those of you with kids." It was Carl. You've got to love a guy who makes butters from scratch on a whim.

Of course I responded asking for the recipe. I'm a Varble and Varbles love peanut butter. Pair it with coffee and it's pretty much our lifeblood. I'm also a girl who finds fun in making things from absolute scratch and putting them in jars.

I've never made peanut butter from scratch. And to be honest, I've never eaten almond butter. To Carl's point, it's always been too expensive. Although I will say, by the time I bought raw almonds from my local Co-Op, it wasn't that much of a savings from the pre-made stuff. But that's what you get buying local, organic, fair-trade nuts.

Below is my translation of Carl's recipe. It turned out amazing, and completely worth the 10-or-so minutes of very loud food processing. Carl was right, you have to be patient - butter isn't made in 30 seconds.

Carl's Honey Almond Butter

Carl used 3:1 almonds to walnuts. I used only almonds, but I did add walnut oil because almonds just don't have enough oil on their own. You can do it either way.

4 cups raw almonds
4 tbs walnut oil
2 tbs honey
1/8 tsp salt

1. Chop the almonds before putting them into the bowl of a food processor.
   (This seems like an unnecessary step until you've heard the awful noise of whole almonds being blasted around a food processor. Trust me.)
2. Pure for 2 minutes and then add 2 tbs walnut oil
3. Pure for 2 more minutes and then add 2 tbs walnut oil, honey, and salt
4. Continue to pure 2 minutes at a time until butter goes beyond the state of ground nuts and begins to smear along the side of the processor bowl. Pause and scrape every 2 minutes. Butter will be hot, and may steam - this is okay but it's the reason I like to stop every 2 minutes or so and mix things up. Getting butter may take a while, but be patient. It will form.
5. Oils in the butter can spoil (and remember you have no preservatives here) so store in a tight lidded jar in the refrigerator. Let butter come to room-temp before mixing and spreading. Almond butter will keep up to 2-3 weeks refrigerated.