A huge staple in a paleo kitchen (especially when it comes to grain-free bread and baked items) is almond flour/meal.  The only real difference between the two is that almond meal tends to be a bit coarser and is ground with the skins still intact, while almond flour is made from ground-up blanched almonds.  "Blanched" just means that the skins have been removed.  In my experience, almond meal is useable interchangeably with almond flour if it is fine enough, as is the case with this method.

Anyway, this stuff is finally becoming more widely available in stores, which is great.  The price, however, isn't so great.  That's why I like to use the almonds I buy for as many things as possible.  If you've seen my post about How to Make Nut Milk, I explained that once I've reared the milk from the almonds, I strain the almond pieces from it and set them aside to dry in a dehydrator.

You can watch this video link from the beginning to see how to make almond milk first and then use the pulp from that same batch of almonds to make the meal, as I outline in this recipe.

These pieces are already broken up pretty well, but they're still pretty coarse and can only be used in specific recipes in lieu of finer almond meal or almond flour (for example, I used these thicker pieces in my batch of Primal Palate's Apple Crisp recipe, and the crunch was outstanding).  In order to use this leftover almond "pulp" from my milk, it needs to be finer for most recipes that call for it.

So what do I do?  Whip out the handy Nutribullet, of course!

Homemade Almond Meal

Prep time: 10 minutes   Cook time: 0 minutes   Total time: 10 minutes

Yield: Varies

Directions

Ingredients & Supplies

1.  Select the milling blade for your grinding machine (the Nutribullet has one of these and most other food processors should, too).

2.  Place almonds/almond pulp in your Nutribullet or food processor.  Attach milling blade firmly on top of the Nutribullet.

3.  (Continued below picture)

Whole almonds OR pulp from homemade nut milk (make sure it is completely dry, whichever you choose)

Nutribullet or high-quality food processor/blender, like a Vitamix

Container for storage

 

3.  Grind in Nutribullet/processor until the almonds or almond pieces are very fine, resembling sand.  If you're using strained and dehydrated almond pulp, like I do, this should only take about 10 seconds.  If you're using whole almonds, it will take a bit longer.

 

4.  Once this consistency is reached, you're done!  Store it to be used in whatever recipes call for it.  This is a great money saver because this one batch of almonds has now reared milk AND flour for you.  Talk about a Paleo hack!