Sunflower Seed Butter

I'm new to blogging, this is my first. It was inspired by today's attempt at making sunflower seed butter. I'm not really a good cook but not a bad one either. I'm just not very good at following directions, so while some things turn out great, some things don't. Today was one of those days that didn't turn out so well.

A few weeks ago I was in Trader Joe's and they were offering samples of sunflower seed butter. Pretty yummy. The only problem was that it has added sugar. In our house we try to avoid sugars. Well, how hard can it be to make?

I bought a couple bags of raw sunflower seeds.We have one of those Omega juice extractors that according to the instruction booklet can be used to make nut butters. I put the seeds in and let it grind but it came out more like a grainy flour consistency. Then I remembered something about adding oil. I checked the instruction book. It actually has a recipe - nuts or seeds and a little peanut oil. I don't have peanut oil, but hey why not try it with coconut oil. When getting the coconut oil out I saw that there were some dates in the cupboard so threw those in too. At this point I had oily bits, powdery bits and sticky bits. The booklet does say that it might need to be put through several times to get the right consistency. The second time through it was still a bit dry so I added more oil and put it through again. Third time through it looked and felt weird, it actually was getting more coarse, kind of grainy. Nothing butter like about it. What to do with this oily lumpy mess... make cookies?

I added spelt flour, what was left of a jar of molasses (the only sweetener I had in the house) and powdered ginger and cinnamon. Lumpy, sticky, doughy mess. At this point I actually stood over the garbage with it about to throw it out but decided to keep moving forward. I eventually worked it into more of a doughy ball, less sticky and oily. I pressed it flat into a cookie sheet, cut it into squares and baked it at 350 for 15 min.

Not great but edible enough for my 20 month old daughter who doesn't know any better than to enjoy something that is too doughy and not sweet enough. She also had fun helping me at every stage of the process.