The Best Peanut Butter We Tried Is An Unbeatable Classic

In a very real way, rating peanut butter is like rating nostalgia. It's very difficult, if not impossible, to keep your memories out of the way when you're doing a peanut butter taste test, because whatever brand your family bought when you were a kid becomes the definitive peanut butter for you. If you grew up eating Jif, for instance, then it's all too easy to grade every peanut butter you try on a scale from Jif to Not Jif, leaving no room for other brands trying different things to surprise you.

So when The Takeout does a taste test and declares that Skippy is the king of peanut butter, a bit of skepticism is warranted. Like, okay, sure. What other scorching hot takes do we have? Are we going to say that the best movie of all time is "Citizen Kane," or that the best Led Zeppelin song is "Stairway to Heaven?" Well, no, because the correct answers are "Jeanne Dielman" and "Over the Hills and Far Away", respectively. But we mean what we say about Skippy.

In a 10-jar field including Peter Pan ("bland, bordering on nonexistent"), Reese's ("certainly gets the job done"), and Jif ("a classic"), Skippy still comes out on top. Shaan Merchant, writing for The Takeout, declares it "the platonic ideal of peanut butter," with a texture that's "thick and creamy without getting stuck in your cheeks" and a taste that's "sweet and salty in perfect balance." On top of that, "its peanut flavor is much stronger than the non-natural leading brands, too."

Although Jif has outsold Skippy since the '80s, that familiar blue-labeled brand remains a stalwart second place in terms of sales (behind private label, at least), and in terms of taste, it's even better. It's impossible to deny the smooth mouthfeel of the Creamy variety, or the delightful chunks of Crunchy Skippy that liven up any sandwich, cracker, or celery stick you'd care to place it on. Choosy moms may choose Jif, but Takeout writers prefer Skippy.