It’s Peanut Butter Jelly Time! How to Make Your Own Peanut Butter in 3 Minutes

Mmmm. Peanut Butter. So good, and so simple, yet most people buy it already made and full of salt and preservatives.

Hold on to your hats, ‘cause today we’re making peanut butter with just one ingredient: Peanuts.  

Oh yeah.

In roughly 3 minutes, start to finish, you can have fresh peanut butter, and it is so simple you won’t believe it.

This would be a good project to have the kiddos help with, because it’s kind of fun to watch the transformation.

First, we need our ingredients: 16 ounces (that’d be a pound) of unsalted shelled peanuts. You can use salted peanuts too, but I prefer the no sodium aspect of unsalted. Safeway had a sale on peanuts recently for 2 for $4.00 on Planters, so that’s what I have. You can probably find them even cheaper in the bulk section or at Trader Joe’s. Note: if you want, you could add 1-2 tablespoons of a nuetral oil during the blending process to make the peanut butter super creamy. Depends on your tastes and if you’re concerned about calories.

Pour the peanuts into a high speed blender. If you only have a food processor, it will work too, it’ll just take a little longer.

Blend on “1,” for a Ninja, or “Low” for other brands, until you have a peanut butter consistency you like. Seriously, it’s that easy. It took me a total of three minutes. If you have a food processor, count on 6-10 minutes, and be sure to scrape the sides down every so often. (Ed Note: If you’re using a Ninja and find that “1” is just not cutting it for you, bump up to “2” and see if that helps. I would not recommend blending on “3” for nut butters – it’s just too fast and you won’t get anything but chopped nuts.)

This was after one minute, notice that the bottom half already looks like peanut butter:

This was after two minutes, mostly all combined:

After a couple of minutes, stop and push down any peanut dust that isn’t getting incorporated before you finish blending to make sure none goes to waste and then resume blending. Blend until you get a thickness you like. It will thicken up more the longer you blend it.

Voila. Peanut butter in three minutes.

Finish it off by scooping into a very fancy container and storing in the fridge or pantry. You can see I went with something super high end.

Let’s review the steps:

• Pour 16 ounces (or more) of peanuts into a high speed blender or food processor.
• Blend for about 2 minutes on a low setting, stopping to scrape down the sides if needed
• Blend for another minute or two until you get the consistency you like (longer for food processors)
• Enjoy, and try not to eat it all before you put it in your fancy storage container

And, that’s all there is to it. I admit to licking the spoon. A few times. Please don’t tell 2Chili I double-dipped!