In the interest of eating organic food (no more hidden chemicals killing off my good bacteria), I knew we needed to finally make the switch to organic peanut butter. Peanuts are typically grown as a rotation crop with cotton and soybeans, both of which are heavily sprayed and not intended for human ingestion. I confess I do really love the commercial-style sweetened peanut butter with its added chemicals and have never been a huge fan of the natural stuff. The best price I could find for organic peanut butter was $8 for a pint and for a while, I have simply ignored it and bought Jif or whatever.
Then I remembered an old favorite place of mine, Koinonia farms in Georgia. I buy my pecans from them with fond memories, but they sell other things, too. They have organic raw peanuts for peanuts (har har - for cheap). Then I remembered my dad's commercial peanut butter machine, salvaged from a grocery store through his business years ago.
Light bulb!
Last night, I roasted several trays of peanuts and Dad brought the peanut butter machine over. We cranked out 2 quarts from 5 pounds of peanuts. At $3.05 per pound including shipping, my quarts of peanut butter cost $7.62 apiece! Hooray for do-it-yourself!
We sent Dad home with a pint of still-warm peanut butter and many thanks.
Now the machine lives in our basement and if you're local and interested, email me privately - I am happy to let you have a session with Dad's machine.
14 comments:
Serendipity! I didn't even know there was such a thing as a non-commercial peanut butter maker :)
Oh my gosh, Margo - how great is that!
How does it taste?? I'm thinking that mixing in a little honey to sweeten it up would be lovely.
How cool that your dad had one of them!? We just have to use the one at the store and thus do not see quite a much savings. But, its still cheaper and healthier, too. Good for you, ya do-it-yourself-er!
I'm with Jane---I want to know how it tastes. And honey swirled in? Yes.
I really like the natural peanut butter...with nothing added. The kind I buy isn't organic, but I like that it doesn't have sugar added, etc. There are several places locally where they make their own.
Ooo, I may just have to buy some of those peanuts! Thanks for the link.
This is great. I wonder if I could figure out a way to make the pb w/out the machine. (Probably not?!) We can grind-our-own at our local health food store. It is Not Thrifty but it is organic. Unfortunately so far my children definitely prefer the Smuckers Natural or Krema Natural to the freshly ground (my mom ONLY did freshly ground when I was a child--I should have started my children on that at a younger age!).
Ultimately I want to wean them off of the pb entirely and switch to almond butter...but for now, I just wish I lived close to you!!! :)
Great idea!! I'm jealous. You're right, quality nut butters are so expensive!!
Good for you :-)
And have fun in NY! I've never been.
Jane, it tastes good, like roasted peanuts with salt. I probably won't add honey to a whole batch because I want it to be as flexible as possible and I've accustomed my family to lightly sweetened or unsweetened food. We do love pb and honey toast for breakfast sometimes, though.
Wow - how great that your dad saved that!
Have fun in NY.
Are still sellibg tbat machine? Tnx.
Hi! Not selling, but willing to share its services with local friends.
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