Homemade Chocolate Peanut Butter

Making your own peanut butter at home is surprisingly so simple! I made my dad this chocolate peanut butter for his birthday last month and it turned out awesome - he looves chocolate and pb together. Since it is natural peanut butter (just peanuts - no added/extracted oils, sugars, preservatives, etc.), and because I used dark chocolate instead of semisweet or milk, it's not as sweet as commercial nut butters. If you'd like it to be sweeter feel free to use milk chocolate or even white chocolate! This is great on toast, oatmeal, muffins, or drizzled over fresh fruit - I even spread some in between the cake layers for my dad's birthday cake.

Ingredients:

4 cups raw peanuts

1 cup dark chocolate (I used Hershey's Special dark chocolate chips)

2 tsp. coconut oil (or any other oil i.e. peanut, canola)

1/4 tsp salt

Directions: 

Lightly roast your peanuts over medium heat in a large skillet for about 8-10 minutes, or until fragrant. Watch them carefully so that they don't burn. The roasting will make the nuts extra flavourful, but if you aren't a fan of roasted nuts or would prefer not to then it's optional.

 Place your roasted peanuts into a food processor. Process for about 10 minutes, scraping down the sides of the bowl every minute or as necessary. It is a long process, but you don’t want to stop until you have released all the oils in the nuts and the mixture is very smooth and buttery! 

Just before your peanut butter is ready, add the 1 cup chocolate chips and 2 tsp. of coconut oil to a small pot. Melt on low. You want to remove the pot from heat when there are still some chocolate chip clumps remaining. This is to avoid burning the chocolate - but don’t worry they will melt as you stir the mixture. 

Add the melted chocolate to the peanut butter (still in the processor) and process for a couple minutes, scraping down the sides of the bowl as necessary. Add your salt to taste and process more. The end consistency will be runnier than normal jarred peanut butter, but it will firm up once it sits in the fridge. 

Scoop into sealable jars or container and store in the refrigerator. Allow the peanut butter to come to room temp. before using so it is easier to spread. This will keep in the fridge for up to 2 weeks.

*Recipe inspired by Oh She Glows