A College Girl's Review of Peanut Butter & Co.

There’s a lot of things in this world that I enjoy, but there’s only a few things that I would go as far to say that I love.

Peanut butter is one of those things.

The PB&J has been my favorite sandwich for as long as I can remember, and I now can’t fathom oatmeal without a drizzle of peanut butter goodness.

When I heard about PB&Co via the blog world a few years ago, I was positively delighted. A company specializing in JUST peanut butter?

Oh yes. But oddly, I never actually ended up buying a PB&Co peanut butter because a) when I was younger, my family bought Jif from Costco and then b) a few years back, I started making my own peanut butter.

However, recently I saw PB&Co again in the store and decided it was well about time I investigated this peanut palooza.

So naturally, when PB&Co sent me four of its most popular flavors to sample, my sentiments sounded something like this: :

YES YES YESYES YES YES YES YESYES YES YES YES YESYES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YESYES YES YES YES YESYES YES YES YES YES. Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww yeah. Woop woop woop woop. This shiz is bananas—b-a-n-a-n-a-s. Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness. FINALLYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY. My life is now complete. YES YES YES YES YES. YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YESYES YES YES YES YESYES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YESYES YES

Ya know, casual.

Here’s my take on the four flavors that I was sent to sample:

Old-Fashioned Crunchy

When it comes to crunchy vs. creamy, I’m totally a crunchy kinda gal. {cue hippie jokes here}. Texture and consistency are of utmost importance, which is exactly why this peanut butter ROCKS.

This Old-Fashioned Crunchy was my favorite of the four butters—hands down—for two reasons: a) consistency and b) sweetness.

Because it was a natural peanut-butter (read: initially, the oil is separated from the nut butter), the consistency was a bit thinner than your average Jif or Skippy peanut butter. To me, however, this is not just tolerable but perfect. I like being able to spread my peanut butter, but drizzling is equally (if not more) key. Additionally, in contrast to many of PB&Co’s other nut butters which are sweetened with pure evaporated cane juice, maple syrup, or honey , the Old-Fashioned Crunchy was simply peanuts and salt. As a whole, this is classic at its best. No frills but plenty of thrills and my favorite for sure.

Cinnamon Raisin Swirl

I found this flavor the most intriguing, as I’ve never tried a nut butter that is purposefully flavored. Unlike the old-fashioned crunchy, this butter utilizes palm fruit oil [edit: this is different than palm oil and nutrition-wise, much better!] for added thickness and pure evaporated cane juice for sweetener. I was pleasantly surprised by the inclusion of actual raisin, as well as the overall dessert-like quality. Though I enjoyed it as on a snack on apples and carrots, I think H said it best when she acknowledged that putting it on a sandwich might be overboard. Super tasty for a treat or snack, but I wouldn’t use it to replace plain peanut butter. H loved it and even tentatively declared it her favorite of the four.

Mighty Maple

As far as sweetened peanut butters go, I think I enjoyed this one the most. Subtly sweet with only a hint of maple, this nut butter also used palm fruit oil to make it more spreadable. Whereas the cinna-raisin seemed to have tiny crystals of sugar, the Mighty Maple was a bit thinner in consistency and seamlessly sweet thanks to the liquid nature of maply syrup. For use on oatmeal or other unsweetened breakfast goodies like toast, I particularly enjoyed this one. It was divine as a snack (much like the Cinnamon Raisin Swirl) and also good mixed with the Old-Fashioned Crunchy. H was not as keen on this one because the maple flavor wasn’t as pronounced. For me though, this wasn’t a problem.

White Chocolate Wonderful

I should probably preface this one by saying that I don’t really like white chocolate. I find it way too sweet and not at all..chocolatey! That being said, this was pretty good. I didn’t really think it tasted like white chocolate (probably why I liked it, ha!), but it was interesting and almost frosting-like. H and I spread it over waffles for our “brunner” (brunch for dinner), making the meal wonderfully dessert-like. PB&Co also uses palm fruit oil in this particular butter to make it spreadable and non-seaprating, but I found this borderlining on too thick. Of course, I’ve already professed my love for drippy peanut butter to you.   I definitely couldn’t see myself making this into a normal PB&J sandwich, but I would probably we happy to use it as a snack or dessert item.

VERDICT:

As a whole, I was seriously impressed with PB&Co. I’ve tried a lot of peanut butter now—both coventional and natural, storebought and homemade, crunchy and cream—and I think this was the best I’ve tried in the storebought world. I absolutely LOVED the Old-Fashioned Crunchy and would go so far to say it’s my favorite natural peanut butter available in stores. The three spreadable & sweetened flavors were all tasty too, with the Mighty Maple being my favorite. If you’re looking for a peanut butter without hydrogenated oils that maintains the consistency of conventional peanut butter though, PB&Co is an awesome option. The spreadability factor was right on, without the artificial taste or texture of typical store brands. If I’m not making my own nut butter during the school year (#collegegirl), I’ll definitely be considering PB&Co as one of my top options!

Thanks PB&Co

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