If you're just starting out on a keto diet, we bet you've asked yourself the question "is peanut butter keto?" right? Well, we have all the nitty-gritty details for you along with our favorite brands, recipes, tips, and tricks. Read on to learn all about everyone's favorite snack, peanut butter.
What is peanut butter?
Peanut butter, like all nut butter (even though peanuts aren't a nut, they're a legume 😉 ), is simply peanuts ground into a paste. Sometimes oil is added to help make the butters smooth and sometimes flavors and sugars are added in as well.
The earliest example of grinding peanuts into a paste can be traced back to the Aztecs and Incas but for modern-day peanut butter that we're all used to, the US National Peanut Board credits modern inventors with the earliest patents related to the production of modern peanut butter. Mostly, peanut butter was initially used as a meat substitute during rationing. It was also used for patients who needed a soft diet but also needed lots of protein and high fat.
Today, peanut butter is used in all sorts of ways. From straight up on a spoon as a snack to stirred into baked goods, desserts, even savory dishes. Peanut butter is also used often in marinades or sauces. We can't think of anything that you couldn't include peanut butter on, just look at this peanut butter burger!
Is all peanut butter keto-friendly?
No, not all peanut butter is keto-friendly. When choosing peanut butter for your low-carb diet, you'll want to make sure that the peanut butter is free from added sugars.
Our best tip is to purchase peanut butter that is just two ingredients: peanuts and salt.
We like to steer clear of peanut butter with added oils as well. Peanuts are naturally high in healthy fat so they really don't need added oils to make them creamy. Too often, those oils are toxic vegetable oils or hydrogenated oils. Not what you want on a clean ketogenic diet when looking for weight loss.
Also, clearly, there's no need to purchase a reduced fat peanut butter if you're on a keto diet so steer clear of those options as well.
To recap, keto peanut butter = a peanut butter that is free from added sugar.
How to make homemade sugar-free peanut butter
If you have a food processor, you can make peanut butter! We love this easy homemade peanut butter recipe from Love and Lemons.
This is our favorite food processor. You can make all nut butter this way so feel free to experiment with almond butter or even macadamia nut butter, yum!
Best keto natural peanut butter brands
There are tons of peanut butter brands that fit the bill of being hydrogenated oil and sugar-free but our go-to favorite is Santa Cruz Organic Dark Roasted Peanut Butter.
Nutritional information (carb content, grams of net carbs, calories, fat, protein, sugar, fiber) in peanut butter:
Per serving (2 tablespoons) of dry-roasted oil and sugar-free peanut butter:
- 180 calories
- 16 grams fat
- 5 grams total carbs
- 3 grams fiber
- 2 grams net carbs
- 8 grams of protein
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