Peanut Butter, Ambrosia of the Roz

By Roz Young, January 24 2012

This week I was twittering and noticed that peanut butter, the very spread of the Gods, was trending. Sweet zombie Jeebus, what was this about… Turns out, January 24th is US National PB day! Well, if we don’t have such a glorious holiday in Canada, I don’t want to live here anymore.


So, I’m also celebrating January 24th as Rozlynal Peanut Butter Day of Holy Wondrousness. From now on, this day will be full of all things PB, next year especially when I’m more prepared and don’t just recognize the day by eating it out of the jar with a spoon. Did you know I have 4 different jars of peanut butter in my house? Now you do. And I love them all.


As I scientist, I naturally wanted to know more about this magical object of my eternal worship, so I read all about peanut butter. Fascinating. Proudly of note, it was patented in Canada by Marcellus Edson, and is full of protein, vitamins and anti-oxidants. Yay! But then, the Wikipedia article started to get weird. Like, peanut butter is also sold mixed with “chocolate, jelly (jam), fluff, and the like”. Whoa, what? Fluff? Is that a food or an edible product of some kind? Like marshmallows? I started to get suspicious that a peanutbutterologist did not write or edit this article. I also feel like an awful lot of things could be in that category of “the like”… Like what? I must know!

Ok, so I kept going and apparently, I mean we always take Wikipedia with a grain of salt, but “Plumpy’nut” is a peanut butter product used to fight malnutrition during famines. The mental giant behind calling famine-aid “plumpy’nut” should be sacked. That’s like bringing antibiotics to an outbreak and calling them “Sniffles’Be’Gone” or “Chicken Soup for the Infection Pills”… Maybe it just caught on and stuck. Or it’s popular with the kiddies, like cholera. I guess if you are dying of starvation, a fun name for your protein source is better than a dry sounding, scientifically accurate description of what you are ingesting. I wonder if Plumpy’nut has extra fluff in it. Maybe that’s called Fluffy’nut.

Then I got up from my computer and went to the peanut butter jar and continued to eat it with a spoon. I pondered the peanut butter clinging to the metallic surface and savoured it’s sweet and salty nuttiness. This stuff is incredible. It’s good on bread, on crackers, in cookies, as cookies, with bananas, in ice cream, in stir fry, and with raw veggies. Just awesome. You should join me next year and we can bake cookies and have a peanut satay sauce all over… I can’t think of anything that wouldn’t work here. I decided to search for a PB pie recipe, and low and behold, the most magical of all things together with PIE. Courtesy of allrecipes.com, the easiest and most delicious sounding pie EVER…

No Bake Peanut Butter Pie

Prep Time: 20 Minutes, Ready In: 2 Hours 20 Minutes
"Creamy, sweet and luscious, this peanut butter pie is real easy to make. Softened cream cheese, confectioners ' sugar, whipped topping and creamy or chunky peanut butter are blended and poured into a graham cracker shell to be frozen."


INGREDIENTS:
1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese
1 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
1 cup peanut butter
1 cup milk
1 (16 ounce) package frozen whipped topping, thawed
2 (9 inch) prepared graham cracker crusts


DIRECTIONS:
1. Beat together cream cheese and confectioners' sugar. Mix in peanut butter and milk. Beat until smooth. Fold in whipped topping.2. Spoon into two 9 inch graham cracker pie shells; cover, and freeze until firm.