What is the difference between how nut flours and nut butters are made?

What is the difference between how nut flours and nut butters are made? - Top view of creative world continents made of various nuts and assorted dried fruits on white background in light room

Nut flours are made by grinding nuts.
Nut butters are made by grinding nuts as well.
Do nut flours have the oil removed, or are they just ground a different way?



Best Answer

It is both, depending on what you understand under "nut flour".

The first kind of "nut flour" is something that may more precisely be called "nut meal" or "ground X" (where X stands for the nut, as in "ground almonds"). Nut meal is simply nuts reduced to small particles (larger than flour particles though) and is created by cutting up the nuts with bladed machines. You can make it at home in a food processor.

The second kind is true nut flour. It has finer particles, good water absorption, and behaves more like an actual flour in baking. For that product, they de-fat the nuts, and then I assume they actually grind them up instead of using a bladed machine. I am not entirely sure how these flours are produced, AFAIK there is no way to make them at home.

Nut butters are created by grinding in a mill, using actual shear force and not cutting, and may need adjusting the ingredients by adding more oil, but that depends on the nut, with e.g. peanuts grinding up nicely without needing extra fat.

I also suspect there may be a difference in water levels, with nut butters working better with fresh nuts, nut meals getting no special processing (but they do dry out quickly after grinding) and true nut flours probably needing a dehydration before they can work well. This is more of an intuition of mine, I don't know if producers actually have to do it that way.




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How are nut flours made?

Nut flours are made from nuts, raw or dried, that have been ground into a fine powdery meal. They can be made from almost any kind of true nut: almond, chestnuts, hazelnut, macadamia, pecans, walnut, etc.

How is nut butter produced?

In our nut butter, we used a mix of \u2153 each almonds, walnuts, and cashews! To add complexity to the flavor, it's nice to have a mix of at least two types of nuts. But of course, you could use just one nut to make 100% almond butter, cashew butter or pecan butter.



How to make nut flour \u0026 nut butter




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