Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter {A Tutorial}

I’m a lover of peanut butter. Spoon to mouth–love it! Swirled into a smoothie–heck yes! Buttah on an apple–don’t mind if I do.

No shame here–I luuurrrve the stuff!

Add the creamy goodness to just about anything, and I can’t keep my hands off. When I’m not eating it, I’m thinking about. All day I dream about peanut butter.

Oh, peanut butter, how I love thee. You cheer me up when I am down. You’re always there for me when I need to stress eat you right from the jar with a spoon. You’re a healthy, protein-packed treat when my muffin has gone rogue.

I found this photo the other day on Etsy and thought, “So true!”When I’m craving peanut butter, I head on over to Averie Cooks to ogle page after page of the peanut butter deliciousness that she has going on over there 24-7. The girl knows and loves her peanut butter. It’s pure peanutty heaven over there.

The idea for this dark chocolate peanut butter derived from Averie’s site. She makes homemade peanut butter look so easy to whip up. And, guess what? It is.

It’s so very easy. All it takes is a bunch of peanuts–I used honey roasted–and a few tablespoons of dark chocolate chips. That’s it–two ingredients. Whir the peanuts in a blender until smooth, and then add the chocolate. The heat of the blade melts the dark chocolate right into the creamy peanut butter.

The five stages of peanut butter:

Add the chocolate and blend until the chocolate melts and the mixture becomes smooth.

The peanut butter process is scary at first. Not scary as in challenging; scary as in the mixture starts off looking like it’s going to turn into butter, but then it turns into a big honkin’ dough ball instead. Don’t worry, the dough ball is completely normal.

The first time I made peanut butter I thought, “This doesn’t look right. Is there supposed to be a dough ball in my food processor?” The dough ball comes with the territory. After the dough ball comes smooth, velvety peanut butter. Be patient, the butter will come.

I use honey roasted peanuts to give the peanut butter an extra boost of sweetness. Salty and sweet are so good together.

The result is creamy, chocolatey peanut butter goodness. The honey roasted peanuts add a subtle roasted sugar/caramel flavor, and, of course, the chocolate takes it over the top.

I spread it on just about everything. I smear on whole wheat toast before I run, add it to my favorite peanut butter banana smoothie for a snack, or dip my apples in it between meals. It’s super versatile.

Or, you can ditch all of those things and spoon it out of the jar and right into your mouth. Mmm, that’s my favorite way to eat it.

Either way you eat it, enjoy!