Tag Archives: peanut butter

Monster Blondies

Oreo-Stuffed Peanut Butter Blondies

Oreo-Stuffed Peanut Butter Blondies If you scroll back through my Instagram to before October 21, 2015, you’re going to find a string of mediocre photos of A LOT of baked goods. In an effort to learn as much as I could about baking, I posted a new baked good almost every single day for a full year before I began blogging.

Oreo-Stuffed Peanut Butter Blondies There were a few repeats and many variations (so. many. scones.), but I feel like that year was crucial to my development into the baker I was when I first hit publish. At the time, I felt most confident about my cookie baking skills and had just formulated my beloved Cream Cheese Pie Dough.

Oreo-Stuffed Peanut Butter Blondies In turn, all the recipes and photos I’ve posted since that first day as a blogger have helped me evolve into the baker I am right now. These days, I’m very excited about yeast doughs and non-traditional layer cakes, and thinking very hard about adding to the doughnut section of my Recipe Index.

Oreo-Stuffed Peanut Butter Blondies That’s all well and good, but sometimes I can’t decide what to blog about or I’m testing a recipe that’s more complicated than I anticipated. Those are the moments when I am very glad I have that year of photos to serve as inspiration and remind me of what I was really excited to bake when I was just getting started, before I learned new skills and started complicating things.

Oreo-Stuffed Peanut Butter Blondies I rarely look at that old section of my Instagram these days, but it’s full of simple, solid recipes that I was once totally jazzed about. Luckily, I was smart enough to write down almost all of them (even the ones that didn’t work) so that Future Me would know where to start when I revisited them.

Let’s all give a quick shout-out to Past Me for filing away the recipe for these Oreo-Stuffed Peanut Butter Blondies. The version I posted to Insta three years ago was damn good, but with all the experience I’ve gained, it’s even better now. I didn’t even know it was possible to improve upon the combination of peanut butter and Oreos!

Oreo-Stuffed Peanut Butter Blondies This easy, no-mixer recipe comes together in under an hour and is far more than the sum of its parts. The peanut butter blondie base is soft, chewy, and studded with melty mini chocolate chips. Oh, and it’s stuffed with a layer of Oreo cookies. I’m totally obsessed with the cross-sections of cookie on the sides of every blondie ❤

Oreo-Stuffed Peanut Butter Blondies Yeah, I was pretty psyched about these when I posted them to Instagram on April 2, 2015, and I’m still pretty excited about them on February 16, 2018. I hope you are, too.

Oreo-Stuffed Peanut Butter Blondies
makes 16 blondies

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter (not natural)
1 cup light brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg + 1 large egg yolk, room temperature
1 tablespoon real vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
pinch of Kosher or sea salt
1 cup mini chocolate chips
16 Oreo cookies

Preheat your oven to 350F. Line an 8- or 9-inch square baking dish with aluminum foil, leaving some overhang on two sides. Grease with butter. Set aside.

Place butter and peanut butter in a small microwave-safe bowl. Melt together in 30 second increments, stirring in between, until smooth. Transfer to a medium large mixing bowl. Stir in light brown and granulated sugars, followed by egg and yolk and vanilla. Stir in flour and salt. Fold in mini chocolate chips.

Spread half the blondie batter in prepared pan. Arrange Oreos in an even layer over the top. Carefully spread remaining batter over the top. Bake 25-30 minutes (mine took 27 minutes), or until golden at the edges. Center may look a bit underdone. Let blondies cool completely in the pan on a rack.

Use foil to lift blondies out of pan. Peel off foil and transfer blondies to a cutting board. Use a large, sharp chef’s knife to slice bars. Serve.

Leftover blondies will keep in an airtight container at room temperature for a few days.

Fluffernutter Sandwich Cookies {Gluten-Free}

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Today’s post is the third new cookie recipe in as many weeks…except that it’s not new at all. These Fluffernutter Sandwich Cookies are made with the gluten-free cookie base of my Lindor Truffle Peanut Butter Blossoms and the marshmallow filling from my homemade Oatmeal Creme Pies. Put ‘em together, and you’ve got a sandwich cookie that is stupid easy and crazy delicious.

This cookie recipe is based on the Fluffernutter Sandwich, which is a perfect food as far as I am concerned. It doesn’t get much better than peanut butter and marshmallow fluff! That rich, creamy, sweet and salty combination is one of the greatest lunch treats out there. And make no mistake, it is a treat. While peanut butter (the natural kind, anyway) is pretty good for you, marshmallow fluff definitely isn’t! Good thing this is a dessert blog–this magical combination is much more suited to a cookie than a main course.

Fluffernutter Sandwich Cookies come together quickly and easily. The cookies are my spin on the classic three-ingredient peanut butter cookie recipe. My version has six ingredients; aside from the usual peanut butter, egg, and brown sugar, this recipe has vanilla for flavor and cornstarch and baking powder to give the cookies a chewy texture. There’s no flour or butter in this dough or in the filling, so this recipe is free of gluten and dairy 😍

Scoop the dough by the 1/2 tablespoon (1 1/2 teaspoons), roll it into balls, and flatten slightly. They may crack slightly, but that’s sort of a necessary evil here. This dough doesn’t spread much, so the flattening helps the cookies to bake into a shape that lends itself to sandwiching.

And speaking of sandwiching…once the cookies are baked and cooled, make the filling. Cream together marshmallow fluff and shortening. Beat in some confectioners sugar, salt, vanilla, and hot water until a smooth, sticky filling forms. Load it into a zip-top plastic bag and snip off a corner.

Pipe dime-sized dollops of marshmallow filling onto half of the cookies and top them with the rest of the cookies.

Y’all. Y’ALL. These Fluffernutter Sandwich Cookies are SO GOOD. The cookies are chewy and peanut buttery and the filling is marshmallow magic. Together, they are rich, sweet, salty, gluten- and dairy-free, and irresistible!

Fluffernutter Sandwich Cookies {Gluten-Free}
makes about 2.5 dozen very small sandwich cookies

Cookies:
1 1/2 cups creamy-style peanut butter (not natural-style)
1 1/2 cups light brown sugar, packed
1 large egg + 1 large egg yolk, room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 tablespoons cornstarch
3/8 teaspoon baking powder

Filling:
4 oz marshmallow fluff (about 1 cup)
1/4 cup shortening,* room temperature
1/2 cup confectioner’s sugar
1/4 teaspoon Kosher or sea salt
1/2 teaspoon real vanilla extract
1 teaspoon hot water (from the tap is fine)

Preheat oven to 350F. Line two baking sheets with parchment. Set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, use an electric mixer to beat peanut butter and light brown sugar until combined. Mix in egg and yolk, followed by vanilla. Beat in cornstarch and baking powder.

Scoop dough in 1/2 tablespoon (1 1/2 teaspoon) increments and roll into balls. Place dough balls at least 1.5 inches apart on prepared pans and flatten lightly with your fingertips. Bake 6 minutes, until no longer shiny. Let cool ten minutes on the pans before removing to a rack to cool completely.

To make the filling, cream the marshmallow fluff and shortening with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Beat in confectioner’s sugar and salt. Add in vanilla and hot water and mix on high until the filling is very fluffy.

Assemble sandwich cookies. Load filling into a piping bag or zip-top freezer bag and snip off a small corner. Pipe a dime-sized dollop onto the middle of the underside of one cookie. Top with a second plain cookie, with the underside filling-side-in. Repeat with all remaining cookies.

Cookies will keep very well covered at room temperature for up to a week.

Note:

You may use an equal volume of softened butter in place of shortening. This will mean that your cookies are no longer dairy-free.

Lindor Truffle Peanut Butter Blossoms

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I spent this past weekend working on a huge tea party. I made vegetarian Cornish pasties, three kinds of pie (including this one), and two flavors of scones for 100 guests. I’ve done parties for 300+, but this event was my Everest. Note to bakers everywhere: if you’re making pastry for 100, spring for a sous chef. It’s been three full days since that party, and I still haven’t fully recovered.

Since I’m all pastried out, I’m keeping it simple today with these Lindor Truffle Peanut Butter Blossoms. That’s right, classic Peanut Butter Blossoms are dressed up with milk chocolate Lindt Lindor Truffles!

The cookie base is rich, chewy, and chock-full of peanut butter flavor. And did I mention that it just happens to be gluten-free? That’s right–there’s no wheat flour in these little cookies 😊 The structure comes from a combination of creamy peanut butter, eggs, and cornstarch. Add a little baking powder, and the resulting cookies come out super soft and puffy.

Oh, I almost forgot the best part–these peanut butter cookies come together in less than half an hour and don’t require a chill!

While you could certainly serve the peanut butter cookies by their lonesome, it’s the holidays, so they are just screaming for a little something extra! Peanut Butter Blossoms are traditionally made with Hershey’s Kisses–and you may certainly go that route here–but why not try something a little more decadent? Lindt Lindor Truffles are everywhere this time of year. I’m not a huge candy person, but I can’t resist their chocolate shells and creamy ganache centers. Here, they’re pressed into the tops of our warm peanut butter cookies, making every bite creamy and luxurious. I prefer the milk chocolate variety, but you may use dark chocolate or any other flavor you like. A warning, however, that Lindor Truffles do contain gluten (a fact which I somehow overlooked until right before I hit publish today). If you or one of your guests must be gluten-free, I suggest using the traditional Hershey’s Kisses or any other gluten-free chocolate you enjoy.

Seriously, y’all. These little cookies are so good–perfect for all your holiday parties and cookie swaps. Lindor Truffle Peanut Butter Blossoms are guaranteed holiday crowd pleaser ❤️💚

Lindor Truffle Peanut Butter Blossoms
makes about 2 dozen cookies

1 1/2 cups creamy-style peanut butter* (almost an entire 16.3 ounce jar; I used Skippy)
1 1/2 cups light brown sugar
1 large egg + 1 large egg yolk, room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 tablespoons cornstarch
3/8 teaspoon baking powder
24-25 Lindt Lindor Truffles (I use the Milk Chocolate variety), unwrapped

Preheat oven to 350F. Line two baking sheets with parchment. Set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, use an electric mixer to beat peanut butter and light brown sugar until combined. Mix in egg and yolk, followed by vanilla. Beat in cornstarch and baking powder.

Scoop dough in 2 tablespoon increments and roll into balls. Place dough balls at least 2 inches apart on prepared pans. Bake 8-9 minutes, until no longer shiny. Let cool five minutes on the pans before pressing one Lindt Lindor Truffle into the top of each cookie. Let cool and additional ten minutes before removing to a rack or serving plate.

Truffles will re-solidify after several hours at room temperature. They are best eaten with a napkin handy to catch any drips from the ganache centers. Cookies will keep in an airtight container at room temperature for up to a week.

Note:

Do not use natural peanut butter here. These cookies need the homogenous texture of creamy-style peanut butter.

Ultimate Chocolate-Peanut Butter Brownies

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Yesterday was full of surprises. At 6pm I was headed to the grocery store to pick up cilantro for the chicken fajitas I was making at work, when my boss called. Three hours later, I was serving dinner to Nobel Peace Prize Nominee Victor Ochen. Just…what?

Now, if I had known that a Nobel Peace Prize Nominee were coming to dinner, I probably would have done a few things differently. I would have worn makeup and a nicer outfit, for one. And I probably wouldn’t have put chicken fajitas and brownies on the menu. But when life throws you a huge curveball, you just have to go with it.

I still haven’t had time to absorb it all, but I know one thing to be true: everyone loves chocolate and peanut butter, even Nobel Peace Prize Nominees. When I cleared the dinner plates and brought out dessert, I didn’t know what to expect. Do Ugandan humanitarians like peanut butter?* Is it weird to serve candy-topped brownies to someone who spoke at the United Nations just moments before showing up at my boss’s apartment in Brooklyn Heights?** What does a person even do when they find out they’re throwing an impromptu dinner party for one of the ten most influential people in Africa?***

1. Yes.
2. Probably.
3. They make extra guacamole and thank their lucky stars that they brought dessert to work.

Yeah, yesterday was weird. But it was also amazing.

But enough about my day. Let’s talk about these Ultimate Chocolate-Peanut Butter Brownies. They’re goooood. And how couldn’t they be? The base is my favorite cocoa brownie recipe. It’s layered with a mixture of peanut butter and sweetened condensed milk. All of that is topped with Reese’s Pieces, chocolate chips, chopped peanuts, and miniature peanut butter cups. They’re a chocolate and peanut butter lover’s dream dessert!

I can usually restrain myself around baked goods, but I ate two of these for breakfast yesterday. They’re that delicious. Knowing I’d eat the whole batch if they remained in my apartment, I boxed them up so my boss could take them to her office. And thank goodness I did–if they hadn’t been on the counter, I don’t know what I would have served for dessert last night.

Ultimate Chocolate-Peanut Butter Brownies
makes one 8- or 9-inch pan, 16-25 brownies

10 tablespoons unsalted butter
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup light brown sugar, packed
3/4 cup + 2 tablespoons cocoa powder (natural or dutch process)
2 large eggs, cold
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon Kosher or sea salt
1 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk
3/4 cup creamy peanut butter
1 cup Reese’s Pieces Baking Pieces
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup roasted salted peanuts, chopped
1/2 cup miniature peanut butter cups

Preheat oven to 325F. Grease an 8- or 9-inch square baking dish and line with parchment. Grease the parchment. Set aside.

Melt butter in a saucepan or the microwave. Stir butter, sugars, and cocoa together in a large mixing bowl. Let mixture cool for a couple of minutes. Add the eggs one-by-one, mixing until they are completely incorporated. Stir in vanilla extract. Fold in flour and salt just until combined. Spread batter in prepared pan. Set aside.

In a small mixing bowl, whisk together sweetened condensed milk and peanut butter. Mixture will be thick. Drop spoonfuls of the mixture over the top of the brownie batter. Spread it out with a silicone spatula. Sprinkle the top with Reese’s Pieces Baking Pieces, chocolate chips, chopped peanuts, and miniature peanut butter cups. Lightly press toppings into the condensed milk layer.

Bake for 30-32 minutes, until the center just barely jiggles when the pan is jostled. Let the brownies cool completely in the pan on a rack. Use parchment to lift cooled brownies out of the pan. Slice and serve.

Brownies will keep in an airtight container at room temperature for up to five days, or in the refrigerator for up to a week.

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sweets & sass from a baking brooklynite.