Creamy and super buttery homemade vegan butter! Easy 7-ingredient recipe that is spreadable, melts fabulously on toast and is great for baking and frying.
I can’t even tell you how pleased I am about this homemade vegan butter!
It is just perfect. It’s wonderful on bread, for spreading (and melting) on toast, you can use it for baking, for frying, for whatever you would usually use your vegan butter for.
And it’s homemade!
It has a wonderfully buttery flavor and takes all of about 5 minutes to make (a little longer to set).
Why Make Your Own Vegan Butter?
Now you might be asking: why do I want to make my own vegan butter when I can just buy some?
Well here’s the thing – a very common question I get asked on my baked goods that use vegan butter is: ‘Where can I find vegan butter?’ because a lot of countries don’t seem to have great availability for this.
Or it might be that you don’t love all the ingredients in the brands that are available to you, or maybe you’re like me and are just delighted when you can make your own things!
How To Use Vegan Butter
I wanted to make sure that this vegan butter is good for various uses, so I tried it for frying and fried up some mushrooms with some spring onions and it was perfect (and delicious!).
And then I wanted to make sure it was good for baking, so I creamed it up with some sugar and made some vegan oatmeal cookies with it, and they were perfect!
And as you can see I’ve been spreading it on bread and toast and just enjoying it all the ways one tends to enjoy butter.
You can pretty much use it anywhere you would use a regular dairy butter.
So Much Buttery Flavor!
It has a wonderful buttery flavor and everyone who has tried it agrees that it tastes like real butter. It really does.
And comparing the flavor to other vegan buttery spreads on the market, it compares very favorably. It’s just damn good I must say.
The buttery flavor comes about from the vegan buttermilk – apple cider vinegar mixed in with unsweetened soy milk or almond milk, I tested both and both worked great – and a little nutritional yeast.
Refined coconut oil is very neutral in flavor yet perfect in texture, so it enables this vegan butter to take on the other flavors added to it.
How About That Texture..
It does get very hard in the fridge, so it’s a lot like a traditional butter in that sense, if you want to spread it on bread or cream it up with sugar for baking, it’s best to let it soften slightly out the fridge first.
Spreading on toast is of course fine as is and it doesn’t need to soften first.
You’ll also find the texture of it tends towards crumbly when it’s still hard straight from the fridge, but this doesn’t have any impact on the result once spread. And to avoid this, let it soften a bit first.
Homemade Vegan Butter Q&A
How long does it keep in the fridge? This is of course a fresh homemade product, so while the oils in the vegan butter are long lasting (the base of this is refined coconut oil), other ingredients such as the non-dairy milk, are not.
It keeps for up to 2-weeks in the fridge, though it’s at it’s best for around 10-12 days.
Can I freeze it? Yes, if you’re going to want to use it for longer than 2 weeks then freeze the excess and only keep on hand what you are going to use. When you’re ready to use the frozen portion, just pop it in the fridge where it will thaw and get ready for use.
What can I use instead of canola oil? I found the canola oil to have a very neutral taste and to work well for this, but other options are avocado oil or olive oil. If you are going to use olive oil though then don’t blend the olive oil in. Blend everything else and then stir the olive oil in. Olive oil can tend towards a bitter taste when blended too long.
Can I use extra virgin coconut oil instead of refined coconut oil? Extra virgin coconut oil can be used but the flavor just wasn’t nearly so good when I tried it. It ends up with a coconut flavor. And I like coconut flavor, so it’s not like I had something against that.
The blend of flavors wasn’t as nice and it didn’t taste as buttery as it does when you use refined coconut oil. Also after only around a week in the fridge, it had got a sort of whitish look to it, like lard, rather than like butter. You can definitely try that though if you have an issue with using refined coconut oil, just know that the result is not as good.
What is the nutritional yeast for? It adds buttery flavor. However, it’s only used in a small amount so you can omit it if it’s an ingredient you have an issue with. You will lose some buttery flavor but that’s all.
What is the turmeric used for? The turmeric is just for color. So you can omit it, but it’s great to add it for a more buttery look. Make sure you only use a small pinch though. I tried it with a ¼ tsp and oh my, the color was luminous yellow, like the color of those highlighter pens!
If you love homemade things, then you will love this homemade vegan butter! It is:
- Creamy
- Buttery
- Spreadable
- Melty
- Great for baking or frying
Use it anywhere you would use a vegan butter! Keep it covered in a glass butter dish in the fridge where it will keep for up to 2-weeks – the italics there are because I tested this all the way up to day 15, and it still tasted okay but there was just something in the taste that was saying, hmmm, maybe this is past its best days!
I would say it has a fridge life of up to 14 days but really it is at its best for around 10-12 days. If you know you won’t use it that fast, then keep around only what you’ll use right away and freeze the rest.
This Vegan Butter Is Great In These Recipes:
- Vegan Garlic Bread
- Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Vegan Pound Cake
- Vegan Bread Pudding
- Vegan Apple Crisp
- Vegan Cinnamon Rolls
Did you make this recipe? Be sure to leave a comment and rating below!
Homemade Vegan Butter
Ingredients
- 1 cup Refined Coconut Oil (240ml) Melted*
- 2 Tbsp Canola Oil See Notes*
- ⅓ cup Unsweetened Soy Milk or Almond Milk (80ml)
- 1 tsp Apple Cider Vinegar
- 1 tsp Nutritional Yeast
- 1 Small Pinch Turmeric
- ½ tsp Salt
Instructions
- Add melted refined coconut oil to the blender jug along with the canola oil.
- Add the apple cider vinegar to the unsweetened soy or almond milk and stir in so that it curdles into buttermilk. Add the buttermilk to the blender.
- Add the nutritional yeast, small pinch of turmeric and salt.
- Blend very well until smooth.
- Pour out into a butter dish and refrigerate until set.
- Remove from the fridge to thaw for a few minutes if using on fresh bread or creaming with sugar for baking.
Video
Notes
- The coconut oil must be refined coconut oil and not extra virgin coconut oil.
- Avocado oil is a great option to use instead of canola oil. Olive oil also works but bear in mind that high speed blending can cause olive oil to become bitter. If using olive oil, add it in at the end and mix in without blending.
- Storing: This lasts up to 2 weeks in the fridge. If you need it to last longer, freeze the excess and only keep what you will use within 2-weeks in your fridge.
- Make it soft and spreadable: This butter recipe above comes out a lot like a traditional butter in that it’s very firm straight out the fridge and needs to soften first before it becomes spreadable (unless you’re spreading on toast, in which case you’re good to go!). This makes it great for the purposes that a regular butter is good for. However, if you want to use it mostly as a spread (that also works for baking and frying) and want it soft and spreadable straight out of the fridge then adapt the first two ingredients of the recipe as follows: ½ cup (120ml) Refined Coconut Oil and ½ cup (120ml) Canola Oil or Avocado Oil (OR ¼ cup (60ml) of each canola oil and avocado oil) and then follow the rest of the recipe exactly as it is. This results in a soft, spreadable vegan butter that still works great for baking and frying. Thanks to one of our readers for experimenting with the recipe and coming up with this adaptation.
- This recipe makes one 9.7 ounce block (275g) of vegan butter.
Hi Alison, thank you for the recipe, I am really tired of using vegan butters that have all kinds of additives in them. I am wondering if oat milk will work for this recipe? Thank you!
Hi Eunice, if you read the other comments you’ll see that oat milk has worked for some and not others, it can affect how well it all mixes together.
I’ve made the butter before and it was great!! Now that everything is getting more and more expensive, it makes sense to make it at home. In this batch, all of the ingredients were at room temperature, but I had to refrigerate the rest of the soy milk. Will anything be affected if I use refrigerated soy milk for my next batch?
I don’t think there will be any issue.
Does this taste at all like it has coconut oil in it (even just a little)? I really hate coconut and anything with coconut oil just tastes disgusting to me, so I’m worried I won’t like it since it has coconut oil in it.
We use refined coconut oil so it has no coconut flavor at all.
Do you think this could be used to make buttercream frosting.
Yes it can.
Great. I stopped buying Nuttelex. This works out about 10th of the price.
What do you mean by a blender jug?
The jug (or jar) part of your blender. If you watch the recipe video it will make sense.
Nice to find some budget friendly vegan staples! I’m also looking forward to making vegan pasta salad which I noticed a link for down below, and eggy tofu! I really appreciate ideas as a new vegan.
Awesome! Hope you’ll find some recipes here that you love! 🙂
Made this today – very impressed! I only had virgin coconut butter (already melted in the cupboard due to the heat!) I like the coconut taste, but will try again with refined another time. Tried it on a marmite rice cake – amazing! Not sure if I did anything wrong, but it definitely wasn’t ‘pourable’ into the glass dish. It was spreadable from the start. I used almond milk as I had some leftover that needed using up. I will try soy milk/refined coconut oil etc, as this is very much a recipe I will come back to time and time again. Thank you x
Hi Alexis, I’m not sure if it was a typo or if you really meant coconut butter? Because that would account for the increased thickness. It is supposed to be coconut oil which is liquid when melted. In any case, so glad it tasted good and was a success.
I find this to leave an oily residue in my mouth. I will try the spreadable next to see if there is a difference. I noticed no taste at all. Should I use a tad more nutritional yeast? Also, is grape seed oil ok to use? Not a canola fan and I am almost out of avocado oil!
You can experiment with different oils to see what flavor you like best. If you’re not finding it flavorful enough then I would add more salt.
Hi, I’m about to give your vegan butter recipe a go. I’m making it for my granddaughter who is visiting in 2weeks time. Will this keep until then, or do I need to make it nearer the time please?
I would make it nearer the time, unless you want to freeze it. It can last up to 2 weeks in the fridge but I wouldn’t keep it longer than that. If you do just want to test it though then you can always freeze some and then thaw in the fridge when she arrives.
I thoroughly enjoyed making this butter in sticks in my silicone mold and now I’m going to make the more spreadable version in a glass dish. The flavor is perfect, I’ve already wowed some friends at a dinner party with it. Thank you for taking the time to make and perfect this recipe.
So happy to hear that Jen! Thanks for the awesome comment and review.
Hi – I am definitely going to try this. Certainly less expensive than the store bought butters. Just wondering – this contains salt and when I baked in the past, I used unsalted butter in recipes. I can’t find unsalted vegan butter in the stores. Does this butter (or store bought) work with the salt for baking? Thanks.
Hi Pat, I don’t find that it causes any issue in baking to use salted vegan butter. It’s such a small amount that it doesn’t affect the recipe in any noticeable way. This particular recipe though you can leave out the salt if you like. All the best! 🙂
Taste great but mine seems to be split how do i fix or avoid this issue?
I’m not entirely sure because I haven’t had this happen. But a guess is that if it heats too much while blending this could happen. Also not sure what plant milk you used, but that can also cause issues. I have only tested this with soy and almond. I would let it melt again and give it a quick blend once more and see if it fixes it.
I have made it several times but I used extra virgin coconut oil as I have big jars of it. I really love it even with the coconut taste so I will make the next batch with refined coconut oil to compare. Thank you for this awesome recipe!
Awesome! Thanks for sharing Sally!
This has an impressively buttery flavor! I’m trying to go dairy-free for my three year old. She has Down syndrome and an obvious dairy allergy. (Yes, they’re linked!) I dread giving up certain creature comforts (like buttered toast!) and I’m really grateful for the community of vegan cooks like you who create these excellent options. Thank you!