How to Make your own cashew flour - a step by step guide to making your own cashew meal for gluten free baking from knowgluten.me
Gluten Free Baking Mixes,  Tips,  Tutorials

How to Make Your Own Cashew Flour for Gluten Free Baking

A number of gluten free recipes call for cashew meal or almond meal. But how do I make my own cashew or almond flour? It’s actually so amazingly simple. I’ve outlined the steps below using cashews, but you can use almonds or any other nut. I’ve even made some recipes with peanut flour made in this way. 
This is the time of year we feel like doing good. Giving back. Making a difference. But there are some people who do this all year. Live Forest Farms does this as a business model. When they were exploring business opportunities in Indonedsia, they didn’t fist say “how can we make money.” Instead they first looked for an opportunity to give back. Their requrements for a new business was that it mus be near an area where they could develop a watershed sustainability program. It must also be in an area where economic development, especially that which empowered women, was needed. So they settled on producing Fair Trade cashews in Bali. To learn more about their principals and practices, see this page http://www.liveforestfarms.com/principles-and-practices.html
This is from the Live Forest Farms Website:

OUR MISSION IS TO TRADE FAIRLY WITH SMALL-SCALE PRODUCERS IN INDONESIA, OFFERING OUR CUSTOMERS CHOICES TO SUPPORT SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN HIGH BIODIVERSITY AREAS.

After nearly two decades working in biological research and conservation on five continents, we decided to act directly to support community-scale conservation, and put our money where formerly our backs, hearts, and minds were.  The world has spoken, and we no longer support large scale natural resource development that does not consider communities or place the environment first. Palm oil plantations,  dynamite/cyanide/unsustainable fishing, and strip mining need to be replaced now, and quickly, if we are to conserve the tropical forests, coral reefs and species under threat.
When I was contacted by Aaron Killgore from Live Forest Farms about trying their cashews, I was more than interested in his business model. Having worked as a missionary in Asia and Africa and with homeless outreach groups in North America, I was so happy to see a company that put people and our planet first. Aaron sent me a bag of cashews to try and honestly, they are amazing. Fresh and sweet. And this comes from someone well acquainted with fresh cashews.
I use fresh cashew meal or butter in a number of my recipes. They’re in the base of my Nanaimo bars, they make up my gluten free cashew butter brownies, and they make an excellent, sweet and light cashew flour pancake. In this post, I’m going to show you how to make your own cashew meal. (Though you might be disappointed at how easy it really is!).
If you are looking for amazing fresh cashews that support the environment and build up the community they come from, you can order 1 and 2 pound bags from Live Forest Farms HERE. 
{Disclaimer: I received a free bag of cashews from Live Forest Farms. I was not required to write a post in return. None of these links are affiliate links and I don’t make any money if you order from Live Forest Farms.}

How to Make your own cashew flour - a step by step guide to making your own cashew meal for gluten free baking from knowgluten.me

How to Make Your Own Cashew Meal for Gluten Free Baking

Materials Needed:

  •  A food processor, Flat blade spice or coffee grinder or Very powerful blender. (I’ve used both a flat blade electric spice grinder and my new Ninja Pulse personal sized cup with great success.)
  • Cashews, almonds or other nuts

Step One:

 Measure out your cashews. Cashews make cashew meal at about a 1 to 1 ratio, so 1 cup cashews = 1 cup cashew meal.

 Step Two:

 Pour your cashews into your food processor, spice/coffee grinder or blender.
If you’re using something small like a spice grinder or coffee grinder, blend a small amount at a time. When using my spice grinder I found that I could only blend 1/4 cup at a time. I haven’t used a large food processor, but a few of the peanut butter recipes I’ve seen online suggest that you can do a cup of nuts at a time in a food processor.

Step Three:

 Blend cashews until they form a fine meal. Depending on the strength of your blender, this should only take a few seconds. You want a fine texture with the cashew meal starting to stick together.

Step Four:

 Pour cashew meal into a bowl. If there are lumps stuck together, you can separate them with your fingers.

Step Five:

 Use or store. You can use your cashew meal right away. If you want an easy recipe just to try out, these Cashew Meal Pancakes are really easy.
Step One Measure - How to make your own cashew meal from knowgluten.me
Step 2 Pour into Grinder - How to make your own cashew meal from knowgluten.me

Step 3 Blend Until Fine - How to make your own cashew flour - from knowgluten.me 735
Step Three Note Cashew flour will stick together a little bit - How to make your own Cashew Flour - knowgluten.me 735
Step 4 pour flour into a bowl, remove any lumps with your fingers. How to make your own cashew flour knowgluten.me

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Gluten Free Cashew Butter Brownies with Chocolate Cream Cheese Icing from knowgluten.me
Gluten Free Cashew Butter Brownies with Chocolate Cream Cheese Icing
{click the picture to get the recipe}
Gluten Free Nanaimo Bars - A Canadian favorite made gluten free - from knowgluten.me
This is another recipe that uses cashew meal. Gluten free Nanaimo Bars. Click the picture to get the recipe

Link Parties:

This post is linked up with The Gluten Free Homemaker’s Gluten Free WednesdaysPoor and Gluten Free (with Oral Allergy Syndrome): Waste Not Want Not Wednesday #55, The Tasty Alternative Allergy Free Wednesdays

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Hey Friend! I'm so glad you dropped by! I'm Jodi, I'm a wife, mom of four, homeschooler and world traveler. I've been gluten free for almost 20 years and I share tips and recipes especially for gluten free beginners on knowgluten.me