All nut butters are easy to make, and this walnut version is no exception. This particular variation is flavoured with honey and smoked paprika, although there are lots of other possibilities. The plain version I first did was superb.
Before Christmas, I made a bulk order of almonds and walnuts to use in my attempts to eat a healthy fat version of a high fat diet. I have used both in many ways, and yesterday I was wondering why I haven’t ever seen a walnut nut butter. Today I decided to make one and see what happened.
The bags of Asda walnuts were 375g and I simply tipped a whole bag into a food processor and whizzed it into a nut butter. Nothing in it except a splash of olive oil, but no salt or sugar It was absolutely lovely! Having made what turned out to be quite a lot, I decided to flavour half of it with something. After standing in front of the larder and peering at some shelves, I decided to use a bit of honey and a sweet smoked paprika (in other words, not the hot one).
But when I went to price it all up, that size bag is no longer available, so I’ve used the bag size currently being sold.
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Variations of Honey smoked walnut butter
The plain version was lovely, and I would be more than happy to just have that. If you are not fond of bitter flavours, you can remove some of the tannins from the walnut skins by soaking the mixture in water overnight, then draining well before making your walnut butter.
Or (or as well) the walnuts could be toasted gently under the grill to bring out a different flavour.
As for additions, other flavour combinations I would try include: muscovado sugar and mixed spice or cinnamon: coriander, cumin and turmeric: fine chopped rosemary, sage or thyme, or any combination of those herbs: pomegranate syrup: raisins and pumpkin seeds.
Walnut butter would make a delicious quick and easy pasta sauce by letting down the nut butter. This could be with a bit of stock, or, for an indulgent version, maybe some cream or value cream cheese. Just stir it in and stir it through the hot, cooked pasta.
I like nut butters on rice cakes, on granary toast for breakfast, in a sandwich with a big fat juicy tomato. I think I would also experiment with this in the super easy ice cream recipe. Maybe teaming it with warm spices like cinnamon or mixed spice and serving it with poached pears. Mhmm, yummy.
Ingredients
- 150 g walnuts £1.59
- 60 ml veg oil 7p
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 tsp honey 1p
- 1 tsp smoked paprika Rajah, 75p/100g, 4p
Instructions
- Put everything into a food processor.
- Process the mixture through the crumb stage to the paste stage.
- It will take several minutes and you will probably have to stop the machine and scrape down the mixture several times.
- Taste your walnut butter and make any adjustments.
- Store in the fridge and it will keep for at least a month.
- If you aren’t going to use it in that time, store the remainder in the freezer.
- You will need a food processor to make this, I can’t think of any other way to do it.
Equipment Needed
Notes
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Nutrition
Free walnuts, how fab! I’ve nearly used the batch I made and close to making a second one
I might try this we still have a lot of free walnuts that we got last year from some local walnut trees, and freeze it
I had some for breakfast this morning. Three rice cakes, two tablespoons of the honey smoked version, and an apple. Totally gorgeous!
I love nut butter! I have wondered that about walnut butter but this looks great. I love the idea of it with cinnamon. Yum!