Shunchen Oil Peanut Butter

Rating: 3/10

• 🥜 Category: Peanut, Smooth, Plain
• Country of origin: Taiwan
• Serving suggestion: Peanut sauce noodles maybe???  (e.g. Nagi's - she says crunchy, I like my noodle sauce smooth, but also, this jar would make no more than 2 servings probably)

Tried this one so you don’t have to.

I had high hopes: picked this fancy little nut butter up from a bougie design store and paid a pretty penny for a very small jar. But sadly, it did not deliver. Bitter, bland, and with an odd aftertaste of burnt oil. No depth and no richness - just a flat, joyless spread.

Let’s just say this one is not getting invited back to dinner. (I am keeping the jar, though! ♻️)

Fuyuan Peanut Butter (Fine)

Rating: 8/10

• 🥜 Category: Peanut, Smooth, Plain
• Country of origin: Taiwan
• Serving suggestion: Sweet breakfasts (the best kind) - pancakes, toast, overnight oats, Greek yogurt bowls

Finally catching up on the Taiwanese peanut butter reviews after months of tasting notes marinating in my Notes app (a chaotic but sacred space). This one in two words: pure nostalgia.

Fuyuan claims to be the the most well-known peanut butter brand in Taiwan and is known for its handmade approach. This peanut butter is sweet, creamy, and mellow - basically, a childhood best friend in a jar. If you grew up on super-sweet-and-salty spreads like Kraft/Bega or Smucker;s, it's like she's come back to visit, but now she's grown-up, a lot more refined, but still the same charmer you remember. It's especially dreamy on overnight oats with seasonal fruit (berries in summer, pears in autumn, bananas year-round) and spice of choice, or swirled into/onto a thick Greek yogurt bowl to brighten up a regular degular morning. Now imagine it drizzled over blueberry pancakes. Yeah, I’m drooling too.

Simple, comforting, and just sweet enough: a quiet winner.

Ground Up Cinnamon Snickerdoodle Almond & Cashew Butter

Rating: 6/10

• 🥜 Category: Almond/Cashew, Smooth, Flavoured
• Country of origin: USA

Checking in from sunny Seattle, Washington, with a spontaneous mini review!

I've been staying in an aparthotel while I've been here because I wanted more excuses to check out the fancy grocery stores/delis that Seattle and its surrounds had to offer, and make myself food. Eating out all the time sounds glamorous until it isn't, you know?

I found these single nut butter sachets at Whole Foods and decided to use this one as a topping on my brown sugar and vanilla protein oats (another purchase from the same trip), with almond milk, so I have no other serving suggestions besides that and straight-out-of-the-sachet. We listen and we don't judge.

Flavour-wise, this nut butter leans heavily on the coconut. The cinnamon is more of a whisper in the background. The texture is boosted by the MCT oil. Classic almond grittiness meets cashew creaminess. It’s a familiar formula, and it works. The sweetness is nice - the honey is mild-flavoured - and the salt level is great. It isn't giving me snickerdoodle cookie, though - more a slightly sweet snickerdoodle inspired granola bowl. Pretty good, but not craveable.