How to Make Homemade Coconut Butter Easily
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Follow these simple instructions about how to make Easy Homemade Coconut Butter right in your very own kitchen.
Once you see how easy (and inexpensive) it is, you’ll never think about buying it again!
Have you seen coconut butter in recipes and wondered what it is?
Or have you seen it on the shelf in your local health food store and wondered how you can ever afford to use it?
I’ve been in both situations at different times in my life.
I saw a great recipe one day that I really wanted to try and then read “coconut butter” as being one of the ingredients. What? I have coconut and coconut oil in my pantry, and know about coconut flour, coconut sugar, and even coconut manna…but not coconut butter.
So of course I quickly looked online to see where I could get it and how much it would cost.
Well–giant pause– it cost a mere $13.99 for a “giant” 16 oz. container on the first site I checked :-(.
Now, I don’t pay $13.99 a pound for much of anything, let alone something that is made entirely of — (reading the ingredient list)– COCONUT! That’s it?!
Which is Best for Making Homemade Coconut Butter–Food Processor or High Speed Blender?
Well, it took me back to the day when I was trying to find milk substitutes for baking since my oldest was diagnosed with a life-threatening allergy to dairy and I saw oat milk on the shelf. You guessed it — the only ingredients in the oat milk on the shelf at Whole Foods were oats, water and a little sweetener and sea salt. (Sounds of my “you-can-make-this-yourself” mind churning)
So what did I do next? Of course I tried to see if there was a way that I could make it myself —
Well, I found a post about making it in a food processor.
The post said it took about 12 minutes of whirring coconut in the food processor. I don’t mean to be the bearer of bad news but — I have a seriously strong food processor. A Viking Professional (yes I bought it refurbished). This machine makes quadruple batches of my Savory Hummus a joy, yielding a creamy smooth product in about 1 minute. So I figured that if any food processor was going to be able to make coconut butter, mine would.
I put about 1 pound of shredded, unsweetened coconut in my processor and let it run–and run–and run– and nothing much seemed to be happening.
That’s when I thought that I’d rather have my food processor than my coconut butter. So I gave up.
For awhile.
Fast forward several months and I was at it again.
This time — victory!! For me and all the frugal folks out there. Here’s how to do it.
Now, brace yourself, because if you don’t have one, you will need a Vitamix (you can also order one on Amazon). I suppose that this might work in a regular blender, but I don’t have one anymore.
And though the price of the Vitamix is a little steep, once you see how easy they are to clean, and whip up a lot of coconut butter and:
Other Great DIY Pantry Staples
- Homemade Rice Milk
- Easiest Coconut Milk
- Powdered Sugar or Powdered Sugar Substitute
- – Easiest Almond Milk
- Homemade Nut and Seed Butter
- Powdered Egg Replacer
you’ll see how quickly your financial savings will cover the cost of a Vitamix or Blendtec pretty easily!
How Much Can You Save?
One 16 oz. jar of coconut butter costs approximately $13.99. One pound of medium unsweetened coconut costs me (I purchase from Country Life Natural Foods) approximately $1.75. That’s more than an 87% savings!! (And though prices have certainly gone up since this post was originally published and might still go up, you can get a discount at Country Life using code WHOLENEWMOM!)
I have always said that whole, real foods do not have to cost a lot of money. You just need to be a little flexible and a little creative and have a community of whole foodists to share ideas.
Need some more convincing about purchasing a Vitamix?
- I will soon be doing a post explaining how this great machine has helped our family save TONS of money over the years, so check back soon.
- You can get a great deal purchasing one through my website (special deals and free shipping are available and your purchase will help support this blog :-).)
- I know this sounds ridiculous, but here’s how I think –With just your cost savings on coconut butter alone, if you make 36 16 oz. jars of it, you will have paid for your Vitamix with your savings. Since I have heard of these machines lasting 20 years (they have a great 7 year total warranty), I can easily see you making about 1 jar of coconut butter per year :-). OK. Now you know what a savings nut I can be.
How to Use
– Spread it on sweet crackers, or just on bread.
– Use in recipes calling for coconut butter, of course.
– Eat it with a spoon :). Straight. My oldest LOVES it like.
– As a frosting (it will need some sweetener and will get quite hard, like a stiff frosting.)
– Use as a fat substitute in recipes, but it really needs to be softened first and will make your recipe a little stiffer than otherwise.
– Works great as a substitute for nut butters in many recipes
(Note: For those of you who would like to make a go of making coconut butter in your food processor, please try it and let me know what happens. I just would encourage you to keep an eye on your machine so that you don’t burn it out.)
Storage
Coconut butter keeps really well and will likely store just fine in your pantry for several months. Most likely you won’t have it around that long, however.
There is no need to keep it in the fridge, and in fact, if you do, you will have hard time eating it since it gets incredibly hard at low temperatures.
Recipes Using Coconut Butter
Here are some tasty ways to use your Homemade Coconut Butter!
3 Ingredient Shortbread Crisp — (this really uses only 3 ingredients. And none of them is a packaged mix. Don’t those “3 ingredient” recipes drive you nuts when one ingredient [or more] is a mix that has a gazillion ingredients?!?!
Coconut Truffles — 3 recipes for tasty simple healthy candies
Chocolate Avocado Truffles — Super easy and delicious. And healthy. You won’t believe these are made with avocado!
Recipe Notes
After having trouble with this working sometimes and not working at other times, I have a few tips to help you get PERFECT coconut butter anytime.
- Start with less coconut. This works more consistently if you start with only about 4 cups of shredded coconut. Make that into a butter and then add 1 cup of additional coconut at a time, blending to a butter with the addition of each cup.
- Make sure that your blender is COMPLETELY dry. Even a little bit of water makes things problematic.
It’s as simple as that!
And how creamy and sweet tasting! It will come out of your Vitamix quite warm and runny, but it will harden up as you let it sit. If you need to speed up the process, just put it into your fridge or freezer (or outside if it is winter :-).)
Your coconut butter will become spreadable around 76 degrees, but you can use a knife or apple corer to get it out of the jar if it is colder than that in your home (it sure is in mine in the winter).
NOTE: Occasionally, for some reason, the coconut butter just doesn’t make coconut butter. I have really despaired of this in the past but we’ve managed to eat it anyway. However, if that ever happens to you, just add a few things to the blender and you can have these fabulous No-Bake Coconut Cookies instead!
Special Diet Notes
For Those With Nut Allergies: Note that coconut is not actually a nut, but some allergy groups classify it as such since it’s something that more people are becoming allergic to.
THM: For those on the Trim Healthy Mama plan, this recipe is an “S.”
Easiest Homemade Coconut Butter
Ingredients
- 7 cups unsweetened shredded coconut (approximately 1.25 pounds)
- 1 teaspoon coconut oil (optional for blending ease)
Instructions
High Powered Blender Instructions
- Put the coconut (and coconut oil, if using) into the Vitamix (or other high-powered blender). Of course, you can try to use less. I just found that this is a great amount to get it blending well in the Vitamix to produce a wonderful consistency quickly.
- Turn the motor of your Vitamix on and quickly work the speed up. Run the machine on High while using the tamper to keep the coconut moving through the blades (or follow directions for your blender)
- Run the machine on high for about 1 minute.
- After a brief rest, process the coconut on High again for up to 1 minute until it is of the desired consistency.
- Pour into a glass jar for storage.
Food Processor Instructions
- Put the coconut shreds (and coconut oil, if using) into a food processor.
- Turn the food processor on and process until the shreds make a butter, taking breaks as needed for the machine to cool.
Notes
- Start with less coconut. This works more consistently if you start with only about 4 cups of shredded coconut. Make that into a butter and then add 1 cup of additional coconut at a time, blending to a butter with the addition of each cup.
- Make sure that your blender is COMPLETELY dry. Even a little bit of water makes things problematic.
Nutritional information is provided as a courtesy and is merely an approximation. Optional ingredients are not included and when there is an alternative, the primary ingredient is typically used. We cannot guarantee the accuracy of the nutritional information given for any recipe on this site. Erythritol carbs are not included in carb counts since they have been shown not to impact blood sugar. Net carbs are the total carbs minus fiber.
Looks easy. Will try tomorrow. Thanks
Hope it works well for you! LOVE how much money it saves :). Let me know if you need help at all!
I have a vitamix and everytime I make the coconut butter, it does not turn out. It’s usually dry pasty like. This time it is very dark, like It got burned because of the heat in the vitamix. I used flakes of coconut about 7 cups because I think I didn’t use enough the first time I tried.
Not sure what I am doing wrong, but that is a waist of a lot of coconut.
Gosh I’m so sorry – I should make a video of me making it. Did you start out w/ 4 cups as mentioned in this post? Let me know if you tried that–we’ll figure it out.
Was it burned or just toasted?
I started with 4 cups just till it broke it up a lot then added the other 3. I should also mention we started with fresh coconut from our trees, washed, used a peeler to have even slices of coconut and dried them till crisp. We left the brown layer on the coconut for half of them.
I don’t think it burned, but maybe just toasted.
My husband said it tastes good. I was just hoping for mor white.
Thank you for getting back to me!
You are so welcome. Without seeing it, I can’t say, but if you have brown on the toasted coconut that you use, there is no way that the resulting butter will be white. The brown will be there no matter what. Likely what you have is exactly how it should have been.
If you try with only white coconut you should get what you are looking for :). Enjoy!
P.S. I am wishing I lived nextdoor to you so I could have fresh coconuts from trees!
Thank you! I will try again another time without the brown on it.
We just moved to Belize and it is wonderful to have all this fresh fruit!!
You are so welcome. Wow amazing! Where were you before moving?
We were in Northern Alberta Canada. Traveled to Belize for holidays for about 10 years. Now are retired here.
It’s great!!
I am new to your site and will check out more of what you have.
Thank you for great information!!
Oh wow….so interesting! I hope you enjoy it! So tempting! Have you found any real difficulties there or is everything good? Feel free to email if you’d prefer – adrienne at wholenewmom dot com.
Can I use tried or wet coconut pls
Dried only. Hope you like it!
I tried it and it was a success. Thank you!
So glad–isn’t it the best??? My oldest makes this himself now — all the time!
Thank you for the recipe, I’ve never even heard of coconut butter, let alone tried it, so I can’t wait to give it a go. I have some desiccated coconut left over from making a coconut cashew butter the other day so now I have a great way to use it all up. Thank you!!
You are so welcome and I hope you like it! Please note the instructions to start w/ a smaller amount. More to come–I’m working on other flavors :).
Hey Wild Woman! More great tips!!
I tried making mine in the food processor first also but it was too gritty for me. Did take about 20 mins total and yes with about 4 cups to start… cuz I only have a 4 c processor 😉 But I was not worried that it was over working… I thought that is what it is made for.
So after the processor is done with it, I move it into my nutri bullet for finishing to reach creamy perfection!! Just takes another minute in there. My vita mix is too big and tall to stay on counter and too heavy to bring out except for party batches of choc coffee protein smoothies 😉 as a rule.
I have been blessed the last couple of years to find organic coconut butter (not past freshness date) at local discount store so I haven’t had to resort to making it and am quite spoiled at this point :-/ I use a lb a month for sure. In coffee and by the spoonful too 🙂 Make several kinds of candies that have no sweetener at all; with dark cacao coated coconut butter and essential oils. Peppermint patties and chocolate covered orange being favorites. Though I add some lemon oil along with the orange for a well rounded orange flavor. Also make some without choc for a friend that can’t have it and they turn out like inside of a cup of gold kinda… use sprouted sunflower seeds along with some other stuff for those. She is very grateful and loves them! TY again for all You do for everyone.
That is SO funny that you called me that. I have a small “poster” from my college years when my housemates hung these things ALL over campus on my birthday with photos of me saying “Wish this Wild Woman a Happy Birthday!” It was pretty weird seeing these all over — and it was a large campus!
I’m not sure what you mean by your Vitamix being too big to stay on the counter….oh I know. You don’t want to leave it there. How about putting the base out and put the container somewhere else?
I would love your recipes–they sound great! If you care to share you can feel free to email me – wholenewmom {at} gmail {dot} com. Thank you!!!
It seems that your recipe is no different than a DIY coconut oil recipe that I have read…..is there a difference?
Hi there. It’s totally different. DIY coconut oil is not something you see much at all- it’s only the fat. Coconut butter is the coconut meat in its entirety. Hope that helps–happy to answer any other questions.
I just love your recipes. Great work, thanks for trying to keep us all as healthy as we could.
Can I substitute desiccated coconut instead of shredded ?
Adrian
Thank you so much! (nice name, by the way).
By shredded I meant dried and shredded. Enjoy!
I have tried a blender and food proccesor and didnt succeed. So I tried my Mom’s Vitamix still no joy. Glad to read your update was very frustrated when I couldn’t figure out why it wouldn’t work. I’m going to try again next week. With a different brand of coconut flakes and a smaller amount. Keeping my fingers crossed. ?
Hi there. I think the update will help you!
Do you have to refrigerate once you make it? Also, how long will it last?
Hi there. You don’t have to refrigerate it. I don’t make shelf life claims but typically it lasts for at least a few months in the pantry. I haven’t had any go bad on me. Enjoy!
Awesome! Thank you!
How about adding MCT oil to the coconut while blending to keep it softer and easier to spread?
That’s an option for sure. I don’t need it but some people do add coconut oil to their nut butters and coconut butter.
I was very sceptical . Like you I had tried it in a food processor with no luck but I was making a recipe and was short a 1/4 cup of coconut butter and the recipe had a link to this page. I don’t have a vitamix but a regular mid-priced blender. I just did 2 cups because I wasn’t sure how my blender would handle it. It was a great success! Coconut butter in less than 5 minutes.
:)! Great!!! So fabulous!!!
This worked great in my Vitamix!! I love to eat it by the spoonfuls ?
GREAT! We do too and just made some last night — hope to have a video up soon!
I want to make many nut butters but noticed that vitamix is what is truly needed to save time. I’m interested in ur offer to purchase one from u at a discounted price but I don’t know how. I’m from Canada,is that a problem? Please email me. Important to make healthier recipies for me & my grown son who took me in after my husband passed away. I want to try many of ur recipies,especially since my son is a diabetic.
Just responded to you. So sorry about your situation. I think this will surely help you to eat better. I’m working on lots of things to help our family’s health….will be writing updates as we find new things. You can feel free to subscribe here for updates if you’d like.
https://wholenewmom.com/10-things-you-need-to-know-about-essential-oils-before-you-buy/
Thanks for reading!
U mentioned how one can purchase a vitamax from u at a discounted price. I’m interested……..I’m also from Canada . Is that a problem? Can u send me an emai with an answer ( & price )
Hi there – thanks for reading! There are links to the savings in the post but this is the same link. I think they will ship to Canada – hope so! https://wholenewmom.com/vitamix That is my affiliate link. If you make a purchase through that link I will make a commission. Thanks!
Thanks for the info and encouragement. Tried a sweet potato fudge this weekend and used tahini instead of the coconut butter. Delicious but as soon as it left the refrig it softened up very quickly and needed a spoon. The C butter will work much better I think.
My question is can you use fresh coconut for the butter or does it have too much water content? I have a fresh coconut on hand so need to figure out how I want to use it.
There is too much liquid in there to do that but there are other things you can do with fresh coconut including this: https://wholenewmom.com/recipes/homemade-shredded-coconut-homemade-coconut-chips/ enjoy!
I’m not adventurous when it comes to recipes with higher than average failure rates. Can I sub out the coconut butter for the coconut cream portion of canned coconut milk?
I’m sorry but not clear what you are asking. Please clarify – thanks!
i gave up as well with my food processor! it couldnt get into liquid…
at the end I just added some coconut milk and I ll use it like this!! 😛
Thanks for the recipe though! looks great!
Hope it works well for you!!
Found a 1-lb bag of frozen non-organic coconut at Trader Joe today (Aug. 13, 2017) and will try it with our Vitamix. I have an unusual use for coconut butter. I’ve been using raw, unrefined coconut oil for jock itch – coconut oil is a known antibacterial and antiviral; it works. But it’s messy to use oil, and that’s what led me to coconut butter (aka manna). Thank you for this article.