Nut butters are one of my all time favorite foods (kryptonite) so I’m always playing around with different combos that work.

Over the weeked I tried a caramel/sea salt combo (ever had that in ice cream? wow good) but it still needs a little fine tuning on the real food caramel..so back to the drawing board with that one.  However, the maple coconut flavor worked, and I was able to adapt it to both a nut butter and seed butter.

So these recipes are for a maple coconut cashew butter, as well as a seed butter version using raw tahini (nut-free).

Both recipes have paleo & vegan-friendly ingredients, are gluten-free, dairy-free and 100% real food ingredient approved.

Both recipes are similar, the raw tahini needing a little more liquid because it’s so thick. I used raw cashews for the nut butter because they’re my favorite raw nut (kryptonite) to use.  If you like other nuts other than raw cashews, they should also work just play around with it (getting creative in the kitchen is a fun thing!).

Maple Coconut Cashew Butter Ingredients

1 cup raw cashews, soaked 4 hours

1 tablespoon maple butter (you can try pure maple syrup- see kitchen notes below)

1 tablespoon coconut milk (if from a can, shake it well so it’s liquidy- not the real thick cream)

Big pinch of high quality pink salt (about 1/4 teaspoon or so– I like the salt dimension in nut butters)

Maple Coconut Sweet Tahini Ingredients (nut-free)

1/2 cup raw tahini

1 tablespoon maple butter

2 tablespoon coconut milk

Big pinch pink salt

 *links above are to brands I personally use

Kitchen notes

– Maple butter:  I recommend doing with maple butter, especially if you haven’t tried it at least once.  Picking it up locally can sometimes be hit or miss, but you can always get it on Amazon here.   Maple butter is a thick glue-like spread consistency, where as maple syrup is more liquid-like.

– If you want to make more you can, just use those proportions above. 

– The raw tahini I used was really thick (it was this one). I don’t know if it was lacking oils, but it turned out almost like a paste in terms of texture. That’s why I had to double up with 2 tbsp coconut milk. Still tasted great if you’re a raw tahini flavor fan.

Directions

Directions are essentially the same for each, other than be sure to drain and dry your cashews first.

1. Add all your ingredients to a blender or food processor and mix really well until all incorporated.

It can take a few rounds on the blender to get smooth.  For example, I have a 60 second timer on mine and I usually need to do 5 or 6 rounds at a full 60 seconds each time.  In between each round I need to scrape down the sides with a spatula (the first round or two you may need to stop the blender every 15 seconds and scrape the sides until it starts to all become smooth).  

As I alluded to above, you can try this maple-coconut-pink salt combo with other nuts like almonds, hazelnuts, macadamia nuts, etc.. If you do, let me know below in the comments how they turn out for you!

Enjoy!