How to Make Coconut Butter

Used my 9cup Ninja Food Processor. Added 4.5cups, a TBSP coconut oil and about 25 minutes in order for it to get creamy. But excited to try it out in my butter bread!!! ❤️

I have made this with great success, multiple times. I have a Cuisinart processor and agree the second ingredient is patience.

Tried in my Cuisinart and added more and more flakes until it was past the fill line, but no luck. It did not turn creamy, even with 3 packages of flakes after more than a few minutes. Transferred to my Vitamix, still dry. Added a Tbsp of coconut oil and voila. The oil solved the problem.

Did not work, even after over 30 mins using new GE professional processor. I tried the large bowl, and then the small. Used 4 cups of Kroger Simple truth unsweetened coconut flakes. What did I do wrong? Disappointed, as I was making the Almond Joy protein bites for my daughter for valentine’s day.

Great recipe! I read the distressed comments and decided to follow the recipe exactly to see what happens. My results were as Dana described. My organic shredded coconut was from Trader Joe’s and feels quite dry. My handy lil food processor is by Black and Decker and NOT state of the art. I did blend a little longer closer to 15+ min (possibly because of my little engine that could). It was like icing. The missing ingredient from the recipe is a TBSP of raw Patience. My 8yo soon watched and helped and at the end he tasted it and proclaimed, “it’s a miracle!”🤣

I tried it with frozen fresh, finely shredded coconut, but after more than 30 minutes in 2000W professional food processor the result does not come close to a liquified smooth butter. It basically remained shredded coconut, as I expected when reading the method. Since the fresh shredded coconut is a bit moist I didn’t try with some water or oil. I experimented with various filling levels of the machine, from 50% to 100% but no difference to the end result.

It turned out really good.
Thanks for lovely recipe!
🧃

Made this in my vitamix! Worked like a dream and turned the flakes to butter in under 3 minutes. Wonderful recipe, you’re the best as always!

This could not have been easier. I was going to avoid making it by just buying some, but it’s so expensive. So i went for it. At first I was worried bc so many people commented on having difficulty. I don’t understand why. You just put the recommended amount in, turn the processor on, scrape down the bowl once or twice, and magically 10 min later you have butter. It doesn’t make much either, which I’m happy about. Not a health food so I didn’t want a ton to have to get through.

Like some others, I made the mistake of prioritizing emptying my pantry rather than sticking strictly to unsweetened coconut…I should have read the comments first! Only after I was stuck with tiny particles of sweetened coconut refusing to liquefy did I read the comments…but in combining multiple tips, I was able to salvage the mixture into something edible, albeit not a coconut butter! I blended the whole thing for about 15 minutes total, adding in some coconut oil and a little hot water to help it along, and eventually ended up with something the consistency of marzipan. I rolled it into balls, froze them, and coated them in chocolate…hey, after having to listen to the food processor grinding so much, I deserve a treat, right?

So, the new design of the vitamix motors is to REDUCE huge amounts of kickup. because of this, the blender worked perfectly for me!!

I made the coconut butter with my Philips 300W Pro Mix Titanium blender and it worked! It took a while because I had to let it cool down a couple of times, but I got butter in the end. Thank you a ton for all your wonderful recipes! :)

I’m so happy I found this recipe! I thought I would have to go out and buy it for this chocolate fat bomb I am making.
I only had a 1 cup processor, so I put it in my blender to make the pieces much smaller and slowly added them into the processor. Wow! I never knew how simple this is! Thank you!

I just made this butter, I used a whole pack (250g) shredded coconut. I was a little worried at first as it just kept spinning but eventually turned out well! I am impressed. Prob took about 10 mins or less.

I have a cuisanart food processor. I churned the coconut for about 45 minutes, two days in a row, and it won’t go past that clumpy stage. It refuses to liquify. Disappointed I wasted so much coconut. I think I might just order coconut butter online. It’ll save so much time and effort

OMG! Where have this been all my life?!

Nut and seed butters make my face break out. Then coconut butter idea came along. I only had a bag of 8.8oz of shredded coconut, so I had to use something small, but strong and sharp, to blend it… found my Magic Bullet. With patience,
1) I filled up the cup, blended a little bit,
2) when there’s room, I added some more coconut, blended again,
3) then when there’s more room, I added more coconut … repeat until I emptied the bag (or until my cup was full)
4) finally, last hurrah of blending, until every coconut bits were liquified
5) And…I got coconut butter! I’m so excited. It couldn’t be easier. Bad points- I blended it too long on my final hurrah; it’s coconut milk. Now I have to wait for it to cool down and solidify a bit. (I would add pics, but I don’t know how : )

I spent over half an hour doing this in my Breville 12 cup mixer workhorse (BFP660). I used the 14oz Great Value sweetened flaked coconut I bought from Walmart (with all the additives : Ingredients: COCONUT, SUGAR, WATER, PROPYLENE GLYCOL (SUSTAINS FRESHNESS), SALT, SODIUM METABISULFITE (TO RETAIN WHITENESS)).
After about 10 min, I saw that I wasn’t going to get past the finely shredded phase, so I plopped in a heaping Tbsp of unrefined coconut oil (44g). After about another five minutes of processing, it was looking a little better, but not getting far. By now the flakes, that took up almost the whole bowl in the beginning, were shredded down to taking up only 2-3 cups. I thought maybe the blades didn’t have enough material to work with. So I got out the mini-bowl (3 cup?) for the Breville, and started processing in that. Only seemed a tiny bit better. Plus, I sliced off the end of my silicone spatula twice, trying to keep the coconut falling down into the center instead of climbing the sides. (I was putting the spatula through the opening in the pusher.) At about the 20-25min mark, when I was thinking of giving up soon, I decided to put in a couple Tbsp of hot water. This produced a noticeable result after a few more minutes. The mixture was finally starting to look a little like coconut butter. After about 30min (total), I added two more tablespoons of hot water. After a few more minutes, it started looking even better, and even resembled coconut butter. I never got it quite to the consistency of Artisana’s coconut butter (which is almost perfectly smooth), but I got it close enough for making Millionaire Cranberry Salad. Actually, my final product looks very much like the picture in the top of the page with the hand, spoon, jar, and measuring cup of dry, shredded coconut.
In the future, I think I’ll start with the hot water very early on, after the coconut has shredded down a lot, and will probably switch again to using the small processing bowl once the coconut has compacted down in the large processing bowl. I’m wondering if it’s lack of moisture that kept the coconut from turning mushy. Or maybe the preservatives are interfering???
But despite the final result not being very smooth, it is still quite yummy and doesn’t have that uncomfortable texture that I find in flaked coconut.

So, everyone – if you have a food processor use that. If you have a stick blender, use that. If you have a coffee grider, use that.

You can use anything to blend your butter. Don’t be so stuck on a recipe’s rediculous suggestions that you give up!

I have a wonderful hand crank food processor, put my coconut in it and it just churned this into pulp. Nothing more, just pulp. Blended in a coffee grinder and I got the butter consistency I wanted.

Long story short. Use whatever you have. I’d probably have made my butter in seconds rather than hours hand cranking if I didn’t want to follow the recipes instructions of ‘only use a food processor’

Sadly, after 45 minutes, still nothing but shredded coconut. I added water, milk, and coconut oil. Still nothing but wet coconut.

Guessing my processor is not powerful enough or maybe the blades are tired. I ended up with something that was more like mashed potatoes. I gathered from the comments not to expect anything like super creamy butter but I don’t think I even got close. Sad. I was hoping to pour it over the no bake carrot cake balls, guess I’ll just dip them or something… It tastes great! But I’m worried about serving to someone who didn’t see me make it because of the weird texture.

This turned out amazingly. I was hesitant to try it because of all the reviews saying it didn’t work. I did it with my Hamilton Beach Food Processor and only took about 5 minutes. So glad I tried it because I haven’t been able to find coconut butter very easily. Tastes wonderful! Now I can make that Tropical Fat Bomb I’ve been anxious to try.

I read in many recipes that it isn’t recommended to use a Magic Bullet or similar blender but that’s exactly what I used and it came out unbelievably great! The only thing I did was half the recipe and it worked perfectly. I used Bob’s Red Mill shredded coconut and added a 1/4 tsp of vanilla extract when it started acting like it was too thick and it only took about 10-15 minutes. Thanks so much for this recipe as I am a huge coconut lover. (my only problem with this recipe is that it never lasts long after I make it)

I used my Cuisinart foot processor and I was getting coconut flour for after what seems like forever. I added a little bit of water slowly and got butter almost instantly.

I just made this and I agree with others who have said it’s difficult to not just eat it by itself. Lol I’m planning to try it on the cinnamon roll oatmeal tomorrow morning. It took me about 20 minutes to make, but I only had 1 bag of shredded coconut (about 2 cups instead of the suggested 3 to 4 cups), so I had to do alot of stopping and scraping. Next time I’ll use 2 bags and I think that will be much quicker and easier.

I’ve just made it and it came out perfect! I have a regular food processor and it took 30 minutes to get the right texture..
The R-oreos are really delicious!!! perfect recipe!! Thank you!

3-4 minutes in my nutri bullet, turned out perfect! 2-3 cups of coconut gave me 1/2 cup of butter. Yum! Thanks

I was excited to find the carob bar recipe you have, but I got nervous when I saw I would need this coconut butter for it. My food processor is tiny and barely functional- its better suited for more liquidy things like pesto. I saw some of the comments that reccommended using a VitaMix so I tried using my magic bullet. It would get stopped up after a few seconds so it took a while to get it nice and creamy, but it worked! Thanks for the recipe. :)

Hi,

I just made this today! It’s incredibly easy but takes patience! I have a Breville Kitchen Wizz Pro 2000W Food processor which I was able to successfully make homemade almond butter twice before. Into the food processor, I add 500grams of dessicated coconut because my food processor is a bit big (has 3.7L capacity). It probably took me a lot longer than 20 mins but that’s because I only process for 30 seconds each time then stop. So there were a lot of breaks. But it works! I’ll post the photos in Instagram and tag #minimalistbaker. Thank you for this recipe! Altho, I didn’t add anything extra after. Oh and I think I got more or less 450grams of coconut butter as a result.

I thought I would leave a comment that might help someone else. So it did take me like 20min to get the shredded coconut to turn into coconut butter. It wasn’t working for me at first but I noticed if you add between 1-4 tablespoons of coconut oil that it turns liquidly pretty fast.

I followed directions using organic shredded coconut. It broke down into small shredded particles but never even slightly got creamy. I finally resorted to adding about one Tbs of milk (don’t have coconut oil). My Kitchen Aid food processor has 5 speed settings plus pulse. It still didn’t get creamy, just made lumps from the milk. The processor got hot to the touch and the coconut started to steam. I think I burned out the motor. Don’t know what to do with the semi-processed coconut.

I personally had no trouble making it in a blender. I did two and a half cups of coconut flakes in a personal sized attatcement for my ninja blender. I also added one or two tablespoons of coconut oil, that seemed to help.

I tried this in my food processor (Oster) and made it in 5minutes. Thanks.

Took me an our and the kitchen is a mess but i got it?. First tried in my kitchenaid blender until smoke came out ?. Then i put it in a kind of nutribullit with the grinder blade and it was ready in less then a minute ?

Greetings from the Netherlands

My two cents: it’s a matter of quality coconut shreds. Do yourself a favour and grab some high-quality organic shredded coconut from the Whole Foods bulk bin section (a~$1.50 for a cup) and you’ll be amazed. I just got some and within 3 minutes in my $29.99 Ninja food processor, I had a delicious coconut butter. No issues at all!

I just made it with coconut flakes! Delicious! You can still taste a little bit of grain but it’s still really good! Now I just don’t know how to eat it ?

Wow, who knew. Thank you for this. I picked up a 500g bag of natural coconut flakes yesterday for next to nothing, around $2,25, so I thought I would give it a go in my Nutribullet. It turned out perfectly! I used the milling blade and filled my cup to capacity with the flakes. Once it got to paste stage, I emptied it into a clean bowl and repeated the first step until I had enough paste to fill my cup 1/3. I then switched to the regular blade and let it run into a beautiful smooth butter.

Thanks so much for the recipe and inspiration! I used 2 cups coconut in the 4-cup workbowl included with a 12-cup Cuisinart food processor. Had to scrape frequently, but the recipe worked well!

I had no idea how much I was going to enjoy this when I made it – thanks so much for publishing it I live in a small community and was finding it difficult to purchase. Now I will continue to make my own as it is much better than the stuff I did eventually find to buy

The Ninja blender works perfect for this. The food processor does not. I have the Ninja Kitchen System that includes both the processor and the blender.

Just grabbed your recipe from Mama Eats Plants. It worked great in the vitamix for me! Well… I should say the end result was great. All I could find was one 8oz bag of unsweetened coconut at the store, so I think it took a little longer. I had to scoot down the flakes from the 4 corners of the vitamix almost constantly as it blended (I did low speed option at about 50%). Also found it helpful not to add all of the coconut at once. It took about 10-15 minutes of this before it turned into butter. Lastly- Don’t refrigerate it! It turns into concrete;)

Worked like a charm in my vitamix. I used the Trader Joe’s organic unsweetened coconut flakes. In be beginning I used the tamper-thing to smush around the coconut flakes, and then just let the blender do it’s thing once it got to stage two.

(For reference I started in my Ninja bullet/cup blender because I didn’t want to pull out my vitamix and it wasn’t looking promising. After switching to the vitamix I had coconut butter in 2-3 minutes.)

Thanks for the recipe! I was curious about coconut butter, but didn’t want to buy a whole jar from the store. Glad I could try it out with a couple of dollars worth of coconut flakes instead.

Made this as a frosting for the carrot cake (also from this website) and it complemented the flavours perfectly. I added a bit of coconut cream, to thin it (probably the food processor I have is less powerful) and also some agave syrup, as my friends like their sweets, sweeyt! :) everyone loved it. Thanks for sharing!

I made this today in my 9-cup Cuisinart food processor. I used about 3.5 cups of shredded unsweetened coconut from the bulk bin at my local natural food store. It took just under 10 minutes. Thank you!!

Just made this and it turned out perfectly! Followed all of the instructions and after about 8 minutes I got a thick, creamy coconut butter! So excited to use this and to be able to make it at home so easily and inexpensively.

I dusted off my old food processor which, to be honest, I had forgotten about! I am thrilled with the results and it didn’t take as long as I thought it would! Excited to look for recipes to use it in! Thanks so much ?

I used my Vitamix, it worked great! I did have to add a small amount of coconut oil, as it was too dry. It is yummy and so easy to make and took less than 5 minutes. Thanks for the great recipe, I’m sure I will make it again.

Just made this using a vitamix! Took maybe 5-8 minutes! So yummy!

Thanks, Dana, for your wonderful, inspiring blog! I’ve tried many of your recipes and all have turned out great. Just made the super seedy sunflower seed butter a couple weeks ago and now the coconut butter. Really amazing! Thanks for your instruction. I’m not sure if the coconut I used was dessicated or not but I used a Cuisinart Pro Classic food processor and it took less than 15 minutes, including scrape time. So easy! Results were perfect-as described-and now I never have to pay for the overpriced stuff in the store!! Thanks so much!

I had issues making the coconut cream I ran my Ninja food processor on and off for almost 30 minutes and finally gave up.

I used my vitamix and it turned out great. I also used unsweetened flakes, not dessicated. Who knows! It may be the brand of coconut you use that makes a difference?

Quite literally just finished making this. Ive never liked icing, but my life changed the first time I tried coconut butter as a replacement. Once again this method proves homemade always beats store bought! So delicious and I feel good knowing exactly what the ingredients are. Thank you! I did make one change; I started with a food processor and that would have been enough but when I was done I wanted it to be just a little more creamy so I threw it in the high speed blender for a couple more minutes and it came out perfectly. I had two appliances to clean, but oh well!

This was absolutely delicious and easy to make!

From reading all the comments, here are some tips toward successful coconut butter dreams:

Do use dried unsweetened coconut high in fat.
Do use coconut low in sugar (to avoid clumpiness)
Do use more coconut flakes to weigh down the blender/processor to force more coconut into the blade.
Do use coconut oil to help weigh down the flakes and/or smooth out the butter if needed.

Do not use sugars that tend to crystalise under certain temp conditions to avoid crystalisation/clumpiness (ie cane sugars, maple sugars, etc). I don’t use any sweeteners..

Ugh!!!!!
I spent over an hour with this. I followed two or three suggested tweaks because it just wasn’t panning out.

In the big scheme of things it would’ve been easier to just order coconut butter from amazon for $13 ( since my local TJ and Wholefoods don’t carry this and I’m not about to run all over town looking for it) because I just wasted an hour and $9 worth of ingredients on this task. Huge let down.

I still love your site but I’m not trying anymore recipes that call for ingredients I don’t normally use or have to DIY just to add to the recipe. I really wanted to try to make your raw Oreos but I’m over that now. I’m a single mom. Just don’t have time or money to waste like this.

Had great success. Took about 6 minutes or less. I used “SWAD” brand 14oz. coconut powder (product of Sri Lanka) that was about $5 & change purchased locally at a store that deals in multi cultural foods. I chose this brand because it was the lowest in salt, sugar & had a higher fat content & no additives to retain color.
I used a nutribullet, filled about 1/2 way. Pulling it off & on the machine every 10 or 15 seconds & shaking down the product. At this point it was still a little granular in texture until I added coconut oil, a little at a time, until the product was pourable (consistency of thick molasses). Used a total of about 10 oz. of coconut powder with about 1 teaspoon of oil added. Plan to see how it works out in peanut butter fudge with a little sweetener added to the mix &/or chocolate. Thanks for the guidance.

Took some work but figured it out. I used a Vitamix. The smaller container does not work. I used organic coconut flakes dry as a bone to start. I put the vanilla in with the coconut a pinch of salt and a pinch of natural pure cane sugar after just a small bit of mixing. I started with a small amount about three once’s of coconut in the small container but the blades were missing the coconut so I transferred it to the larger container. Tamping it down is highly effective and it took time to get the right consistency I found that being patient but tamping it a lot helped.

For those who have a hard time getting past the grainy texture and on to smooth… Add 1 tbsp coconut oil. The extra fat content makes ALL the difference!!!

I was a little afraid to try your recipe after reading some of the comments, but I went ahead and made it anyway, in my Cuisinart food processor, and it worked like a charm! Thank you for this amazing recipe!

Amazing! Genius! Inspirational! Made this in my Vitamix from a 340g bag of coco shreds and now I have a stunning mason jar filled with delicious coconut butter that only cost $3.79! My life is changed!

I just tried to make this for the carob bars recipe. It looked like it was working well at first, I had liquid butter after processing for ~5 minutes. I then added a pinch of salt, and dash of vanilla and maple syrup, processed for 30 more seconds and it turned into a dough-like texture which did not melt when I tried to heat it up. Not sure if processing for too long dried it out or if the added ingredients caused it.

Howdy from Texas! I used the super cheap Walmart unsweetened coconut and it was SOoooooo dry when nothing was going according to the instructions I added a Tbl coconut oil,wet pour kind and 2Tbl h2o and wa laa butter!

Hey everyone! So after some frustration like some people commenting I decide to give it a different approach after some research. It was not working in my Ninja food processor so I switched to the Ninja full sized blender and added two and a half bags (18 oz total) of the unsweetened shredded coconut and I FINALLY got it to work! Definitely try adding more and using a blender and seeing how it works. I love mine!

I just made some coconut butter a few minutes ago and it is so wonderful and creamy. I tried using a mini food processor in the past and it did not work very well. Someone in my apartment complex placed a NutriBullet blender on the table we use for things we no longer want and I grabbed it. It worked and making my own is so much cheaper than buying it like I did years ago. I am so very pleased.

I just made this in my ninja food processor. Came out great. 2 bags of unsweetened coconut flakes in the larger size processor for about 8 mins. Thank you so much.

Hi!
I just made this. Only had Tjoes coconut but it worked fine. Amazed how these dry crumbs turn to butter. Now to make something with it….thinking the carob bars you posted. ?

Worked like a charm!

I made it in my processor and it turned out more like a paste and even when i extended the process, it maintained a paste. What could have gone wrong?

Worked perfectly in my VitaMix. Used 3 bags of unsweetened organic coconut, dash of kosher salt and splash of vanilla. Took 3 minutes…MAX

Sorry, this was a very expensive epic fail. I have a high powered professional food processor and Vitamix and after using both for 30 minutes, just dryclumps. Back to the store for me. This one beat me.

I used Bob’s Red Mill Shredded Coconut and it turned out very dry, not a bit creamy. I added a little coconut oil and, it is as creamy as can be. It is definitely not good to eat by itself, I’ll have to try mixing it in something.

Didn’t work for me either. Used my 64 oz Ninja (Blender/food processor/bullet). It’s brand new and after 6 minutes it finally shut itself off. I did stop and scrape down the sides twice. I let it cool down then kept on with the blending/scraping/blending/scraping and seems like it might be starting to get somewhere but never anything more. Then tried small food processor. No. Tried Bullet. No. Tried Ninja blender. Yes! Finally! Will use the blender next time

Turned out great for me!!! Thanks for the idea.
I used my Cuisinart food processor and it worked like a champ :)

This recipe worked like a charm. Thanks so much! Couldn’t find this in 3 stores that I tried. Now I don’t need to anything more than just buying the coconut.

It worked for me but at a certain point I had to move it from my large food processor to my mini one as the blades were spinning above the coconut.

I made this in my Cuisinart 8c Food Processor tonight with a bag of Let’s Do Organic shredded coconut. Took a little over 10 minutes to make! So good. And so much cheaper than buying it from the store.

Wow this was easy! I forgot the pinch of salt and wished I had of remembered… but I was just so excited! Now I don’t have to go hunting for coconut butter! BTW I had organic non processed coconut flakes on hand so it worked out great!

I made coconut butter and it’s delicious! But I made it in my Vita-Mix, using the tamper as if I were making nut butter. It took about 2 minutes.

Just made this recipe and it literally took 6 minutes with my food processor I used the shredded coconut from the bulk bins at Whole Foods. I have a Cuisinart Prep 9 food processor! I literally got super liquid coconut butter!

I just used my food processor to make this. At first, it felt like nothing was happening, but about 5-6 mins later, the flakes started to break down and a little bit longer… we have butter!!

Thanks for the recipe. Will be making this again x

This is amazing!! Thanks for the recipe.

I used my Blendtec Twister jar for this and it took less than a minute.
It is so delilcious!
My kitty kept bugging me while I was washing the jar…he liked it too!

well, found my new obsession. Cant stop licking the inside of my food processor!
Also, I used Bob’s Red Mill’s flaked coconut and it worked great!
Would love to try making this with some chocolate as well! YUMMMMMMM

Oh boy! Funny how I didn’t think of using this butter —sooo fast, about 4-5 min—as icing after I used it in your pb/ab fudge recipe! Because I love lemon with carrot muffins/cake, I added lemon zest and a little juice (plus the salt & vanilla options) and wow! Hard to not just eat it instead of put it on the cake!
So THANK YOU for both the Carrot Cake recipe and this icing..and Happy Birthday!!