Homemade Peanut Butter

Homemade peanut butter is so amazingly easy and so deliciously good, I can't believe it's taken me so long to actually make some. This will be remedied, I promise.

Peanut butter is expensive in Thailand. Although I'm sure its price is increasing all over, $6 US just seemed like too much for a small jar. Every once in a while I would find it on sale or just buy some anyways, but in general, I have gotten used to not eating it. And that's okay with me.

However, with my new-found revelation, the peanut butter option may be back.

The problem has never been a lack of peanuts. One of Thailand's most popular dishes, Som Tam (papaya salad), includes roasted peanuts. Which is how I ended up with a bag of peanuts in my cupboard. A few days ago, my friends helped me make papaya salad. It was great, and the leftover ingredients turned out to be great too.

So this morning. I pulled out the bag of peanuts. It was probably about 3/4 of a cup. I tossed them into my mini food processor and pushed GO. Then I thought I "might should" (as my southern friends would say) look at a recipe. (Side note, I'm not just learning Thai in Thailand, my team is also teaching me "Southern" English.)

Okay, back to looking at the recipe, well actually, recipes. One said I needed to add salt, honey, and oil. Another said don't add anything. I picked the one that suggested adding what you think it needs, but included that extra oil is unnecessary because the oil from the peanuts comes out as you process them. I decided to add some salt and kept blending.

The peanuts went through a few stages. Big chunks, little chunks, dusty particles, dust clumping together in a ball, ball getting wet, paste. At this point I tasted it and decided I should have added less salt. So I added some sugar and kept blending. The paste went from chunky peanut butter to smooth peanut butter after another minute or so.

Another taste test confirmed that I should have done this peanut butter thing a long time ago. It was amazing.

Then I had an idea to make it more amazing. I scooped out about half of the peanut butter, just in case my idea didn't work as planned. Then I sprinkled some chocolate chips into the food processor with the remaining peanut butter and blended some more.

Yep. You guessed it. Chocolate peanut butter. Why I reserved some of the first batch, I don't know. How could you go wrong with chocolate peanut butter??? It was even more amazing than the original.

I have a feeling the peanut guy at the market will be seeing me more often now, and not just when we are making Som Tam. Even if you can buy peanut butter at the store, I suggest giving homemade a try. :)