The Finest Peanut Butter: a Blind Style Take a look at

Peanut butter is a nationwide treasure. In 2019, US peanut butter gross sales raked in approximately $2.3 billion. People supposedly eat a whopping 700 million pounds of the unfold every year, with the common child scarfing down 1,500 PB&Js earlier than their highschool commencement.

However peanut butter is an ingredient that goes effectively past sandwiches. I’m speaking about these brown butter rice crispy treats. And a punchy, savory dressing in your subsequent bowl of udon noodles. And the creamy-tangy dip that’ll level-up your air fryer rooster tenders.

So, which store-bought peanut butter is the perfect? Jif, Skippy, and Peter Pan dominate the US market, however there’s a complete world of PB ready to be explored. To seek out out which jar provides probably the most bang for buck, a handful of BA staffers examined seven fashionable manufacturers, together with Cease & Store, Goal’s Good & Collect, and Reese’s. (Sorry to the Smucker’s stans, however for the sake of consistency we disqualified unsweetened, non-homogenized peanut butters, together with these labeled as “pure.”)

We tasted them with a spoon first after which unfold on a saltine cracker, judging every on taste and texture. Right here’s the complete scoop.

{Photograph} by Isa Zapata

Merely No: Peanut Butter & Co. Smooth Operator

The components: peanuts; cane sugar; palm oil; and salt.

The flavour: Every part is incorrect right here. “The flavour is tough,” stated senior cooking editor Emma Laperruque. “It doesn’t style like peanut butter.” And affiliate cooking editor Antara Sinha observed a wierd “floral” aftertaste. “It’s so bizarre,” she stated. The feel is one other downside: “It’s free, oily, and exhausting to swallow,” stated check kitchen coordinator Inés Anguiano. Affiliate visuals editor Marc Williams simply stored asking, “Are you positive that is peanut butter?”

{Photograph} by Isa Zapata