Sick of spending so much money on nut butters? Me too! So I started making my own. This recipe is for Naked Almond Butter! It’s called naked because it’s made without the brown outside shell of an almond. Be careful, I’m warning you… It’s so delicious you may want to eat it by the spoonful.
So why must they be naked? The problem with nuts is they contain a whole lot of phytic acid, and almonds contain a great amount compared to other nuts. Phytic acid is an anti-nutrient that removes nutrients like zinc and magnesium from your body. These are extremely important nutrients. You may be eating a ton of minerals, but if you are consuming too many anti-nutrients, you aren’t absorbing them.
Anti-nutrients are a big problem with grains and legumes. When people go from a SAD diet to a Paleo Diet, they sometimes make nuts a huge portion of their diet, which is not healthy. It is okay to have some nuts but if you want to eat them, try to reduce the anti-nutrients by soaking or blanching. We call this activating the nuts.
In this recipe you will blanch the almonds in boiling water, and then remove the skin. Once the almonds are “naked”, toast the almonds very lightly in the oven, and then make naked almond butter.
I do have a confession… I’m not ALWAYS religious about activating my nuts. For instance, if I’m on the go or out of town, I’ll pick up raw almonds, cashews or pistachios. This is much better than eating any other non-paleo snack, but I encourage you to experiment with activating nuts when you have time at home. My family liked the Naked Almond Butter better than store-bought, and it’s much cheaper.
- 2 cups of raw almonds
- 2-3 Tablespoons coconut oil
- Salt, to taste
- Boil water in a pot. Once it’s at a boil, add almonds. Make sure they are all submerged in water.
- Blanch for 4-5 minutes in boiling water. Remove from pot and let them cool for 2-3 minutes.
- Then peel the skins off by pinching the almonds. This should be easy; if it is not blanch for longer.
- Take all naked almonds, and place in oven on high broil for 2 minutes, or until slightly browned.
- Place toasted almonds into food processor. Process for 12 minutes, occasionally stirring sides. Add coconut oil throughout the processing to make it smoother. Salt to taste, and enjoy!
- At our house, we all peeled the skins together to make it go faster! Make it a race, and you’ll get it done quickly.
Hi Monica! Another thought would be to soak them overnight. Because nuts contain smaller amounts of phytic acid. Their real issue is having high amounts of enzyme inhibitors. These enzymes are useful to seeds and nuts because it prevents them from sprouting prematurely. But they can really strain your digestive system. Adding salt to the warm water helps activate enzymes and will neutralize these enzyme inhibitors, and also help encourage the production of beneficial enzymes. These enzymes, in turn, increase many vitamins, especially B vitamins. It also makes these nuts much easier to digest and the nutrients more easily absorbed. I learned all of this via Nourishing Traditions and Sally Fallon. I think that you would find her work very interesting.
Nicole, Thanks so much for the comment! I DEFINITELY need to read that book. I hope everyone reads your comment too! I have done some soaking in the past, but when making this butter I found the soaking didn’t completely remove the shells and so I needed to blanch them. As far as other nuts go I have read a lot about soaking & activating, and I’d love to learn more. Thanks!!