Before I get to the (super simple) recipe for this delicious sunflower butter, I want to back up and give a bit of a back-story as to why I tried it in the first place. (feel free to skip it and jump to the recipe, if you hate back-stories – I won’t be offended)
I mentioned on my personal blog several months ago, that I was working thru “The Plan” in order to try and pinpoint some of my chronic pain and inflammation issues.
The premise is that not everything we are told is ‘healthy’ (eg: salmon, oatmeal) or ‘bad’ (eg: chocolate, bread) for us, is actually healthy or bad for each of us. In other words, you may be able to eat corn several times a week, but if I eat corn once, I may get bloated and look 4 months pregnant, because my body reacts to it.
To determine what foods cause a reaction (and weight gain – which was not my goal for this, but was an added benefit), you start an (easy) detox/cleanse for a three days to get your body to a baseline, and then you begin to slowly add foods back into your diet. This allows you to see if there is anything you are eating that is causing inflammation and issues in your body.
I got through my detox, started testing, and within a week, I realized that I was reactive, and had a mild allergy, to almonds.
ALMONDS!
WHAT?!?! I had spent my entire life, prior to meeting Randy, barely giving almonds a second glance (who wants to ruin a perfectly good piece of chocolate with almonds?!?). But, I needed extra protein for my running, and he had suggested almonds. So, 3 years ago, I switched to a daily snack of almonds and almond butter, and almond milk & almond flour for cooking and baking.
And here those suckers were – wreaking havoc on my body! (seriously — within 30 minutes of eating three, after not eating any for several days, my scalp and face were on fire – itching, and my lips were tingling). One of the very things I was doing to make sure my body was healthy, was actually causing it pain and inflammation.
I’ve since learned that eating too much of the same thing (whether healthy or not), without rotation, can cause a sensitivity to those foods, which can cause weight gain, inflammation, joint pain etc. And that is what I had done to my poor body! (This doesn’t mean that I will never be able to eat almonds again, but my body needs time to recover and repair from the constant bombardment of this allergy/reaction. Which I am TOTALLY fine with.)
I ended up doing a consult with one of Lyn’s nutritionists, and decided to try sunflower butter, as a replacement to almond butter. The problem was, I could only find sunbutters that contained roasted sunflower seeds. Not a big deal, necessarily, but for my test, I needed them to be non-roasted, or at least very lightly toasted.
No one makes/sells raw sunflower butter.
And so I made my own.
It is delicious, simple, and making your own costs next to nothing.
So, (finally) here you go:
Homemade Sunflower Butter
*Note: The photos in this post were taken when I made my sunflower butter with raw sunflower seeds, so the color is lighter and the texture was not as smooth. The second time I made it, I lightly toasted them (15 mins at 325 degrees). The seeds were quickly ground when the seeds were toasted (5 mins, vs 12 -15). The texture was smoother and the color is a darker brown, more like a peanut butter.
Ingredients:
– 4 cups raw, unsalted sunflower seeds (I purchase in bulk at Whole Foods)
– Sea salt, fine, not coarse (optional, to taste)
– Agave or honey (optional, to taste)
– Light tasting oil to add in for smoothing and thinning out. (I like grapeseed – it is very light and adds no flavor; coconut oil might be nice too, but have not tried it, and I’m not sure how it would change the taste…)
– Not an ingredient, but you will need a decent food processor.
Place sunflower seeds in a food processor and grind for several minutes until the seeds are ground into a flour texture, as shown below. (*Note: this step will take a bit longer if your seeds are raw/untoasted)
The ground seeds will begin to clump. This is when you add a bit of oil to thin it out. Only add 1 tbsp at a time, so that you don’t thin it out too much.
Once it begins to get a creamier texture, add in the agave and salt. Add more oil if necessary (*Note: you will need to use more oil if your sunflower seeds are raw; the oils within the sunflower seeds do not release as easily when not toasted/roasted. When I made it with toasted seeds, I only had to use 1 tbsp of oil. I had to use quite a bit more for raw sunflower seeds)
Continue to process until the sunflower butter is the consistency that you prefer. We enjoy ours a bit chunky – with a bit of sunflower seed in the texture. If you prefer yours creamier, you can continue to pulse in the processor, until the desired texture is achieved.
To store our sunflower butter, I put it in a glass jar with a screw-on lid, and stored it in our cupboard. We go through it pretty quickly, but it will stay fresh (eg: oils won’t go rancid) for a couple of weeks.
- 4 cups raw, unsalted sunflower seeds (I purchase in bulk at Whole Foods)
- Sea salt, fine, not coarse (optional, to taste)
- Agave or honey (optional, to taste)
- Light tasting oil to add in for smoothing and thinning out. (I like grapeseed – it is very light and adds no flavor; coconut oil might be nice too, but have not tried it, and I’m not sure how it would change the taste…)
- Not an ingredient, but you will need a decent food processor.
- Place sunflower seeds in a food processor and grind for several minutes until the seeds are ground into a flour texture. (*Note: this step will take a bit longer if your seeds are raw/untoasted)
- The ground up seeds will begin to clump. This is when you add a bit of oil to thin it out. Only add 1 tbsp at a time, so that you don’t thin it out too much.
- Once it begins to get a creamier texture, add in the agave and salt. Add more oil if necessary (*Note: you will need to use more oil if your sunflower seeds are raw; the oils within the sunflowers do not release as easily when not toasted/roasted. When I made it with toasted seeds, I only had to use 1 tbsp of oil. I had to use quite a bit more for raw sunflower seeds)
- Continue to process until the sunflower butter is the consistency that you prefer. We enjoy ours a bit chunky – with a bit of sunflower seed in the texture. If you prefer yours creamier, you can continue to pulse in the processor, until the desired texture is achieved.
- Storage: I put ours in a glass jar with a screw-on lid, and store it in the cupboard. We go through it pretty quickly, but it will stay fresh (eg: oils won’t go rancid) for a couple of weeks.
Have questions? Feel free to ask in comments!
