Peanut Butter Blossoms with Leftover Candy is an indulgent use for leftover Easter candy and any other small chocolates you have lying around. Keep reading to see what other uses Creative Cookie Exchange bakers came up with for leftover candy!
I just had a fantastic long weekend in Chicago with at least four exciting culinary experiences and apparently it all went to my head because I completely forgot about Creative Cookie Exchange. Despite having brought the cookies with me to share with my brother’s family in Chicago and therefore looking at them all weekend. In over ten years of blogging this is the first time I have ever completely blanked out on a blogging commitment, so that’s not too awful, right? Right??
Gah.
My contribution to this month’s event using leftover Easter candy is not so much an original recipe as an idea. I was stumped at first by this theme because so much of Easter candy is either fruity or fake-ish in nature, like jelly beans and Peeps, or larger, like a big chocolate bunny. Then I thought of peanut butter eggs and wondered what if they could take the place of Hershey’s Kisses in Peanut Butter Blossoms… and as it turns out, they can!
You guys will all be unsurprised to learn I am a little bit of a chocolate snob at Easter. Not a huge one, but I admit my kids were always more likely to open Lindt bunnies and Lake Champlain peanut butter eggs. So that is what got used in these cookies, but any smaller Easter chocolate–or Halloween chocolate or Christmas chocolate–will work just fine as long as it complements the flavor of peanut butter. If that means jelly beans or Peeps to you, well, just don’t tell me! (True confession: Peeps are a guilty pleasure of mine but I still would not put them in a cookie.)
Googling will find you loads of Peanut Butter Blossom recipes, but I landed on the one from The New York Times, and was instantly charmed by the fact that it came from an article on cookie tables at weddings in Pittsburgh. My sister and my aunt also followed this tradition, common in Catholic weddings in western Pennsylvania and Northeastern Ohio (my sister skipped the Catholic part but loved the cookie table tradition). However, unless you are using tiny chocolate Easter eggs, you will need to make your cookies bigger, and thus I changed the actual baking instructions.
We loved these, but the cookies topped with the peanut butter eggs were the serious winner. If you love peanut butter and chocolate you will adore these!
Very closely adapted from The New York Times. Note that if you use hollow chocolates, like the bunnies, chicks and sheep that I used, some of them may collapse on themselves from melting (!). Only a few did and I chose not to photograph those.
- 1 3/4 cups AP flour
- 1 t baking soda
- ½ t salt
- 1/2 cup (4 oz, 1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- ½ cup (125 g) smooth peanut butter
- ½ cup granulated sugar, plus more for rolling
- ½ cup light brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1 T milk
- 1 t vanilla
- approx. 32 (amount will depend on size) chocolate or peanut butter chocolate candies
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Whisk together flour, baking soda and salt; set aside.
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Using an electric mixer, cream together the butter and peanut butter. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl, and then add the sugars. Beat until well combined and fluffy, about 3-4 minutes.
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Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl. Add the egg, milk and vanilla; beat until well blended.
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Add the flour mixture in about 4 additions, mixing thoroughly on the lowest speed. Scrape the bowl as needed. Refrigerate the dough for at least 1 hour.
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When you are ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line the cookie sheets with silicone mats or parchment paper.
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Scoop out heaping tablespoon-sized balls of dough, roll them into a ball and then roll the balls in sugar. Place 12 balls per cookie sheet.
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If you bake 2 cookie sheets at a time, place the oven racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven. Bake at 350 F for 9-12 minutes, until the cookies have puffed, cracked a bit, and are golden brown.
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Remove the cookies from the oven and immediately press a chocolate candy into the center of each cookie. Let the cookies rest on their sheet for 5 minutes and then move them to a cooling rack to cool completely. Make sure the melting chocolate sets completely before storing the cookies in single layers separated by wax paper in an airtight container.
Anyone have piles of Easter basket candy hanging around? Well look no further for an idea of what to do with it, because the Creative Cookie Exchange is using it in cookies! Check out what we made:
- Peanut Butter Blossoms with Leftover Candy from The Spiced Life
- M&Ms and Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars from Karen’s Kitchen Stories
- Easter Candy Cookies from Food Lust People Love
Looking for a Peanut Butter Blossoms with Leftover Candy collage to pin?
I love this! What a wonderful way to use up Easter candy!
Those melted chocolates are my favorites, Laura. I’d love to bite into a cookie with one on top!