The devil made me do it.
That’s the only thing that came to mind when I realized that on a day when it was about plus 28 Celsius, I was finally making the cookies that have been niggling in the back of my mind for a long, long time.
I recently posted the base recipe for making the Perfect Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookie and used these peanut butter cup cookies as an example in the post. If nothing else, a great chocolate chip cookie recipe was born.
The recipe has garnered a lot of attention on the interwebs, and with a lot of attention comes a lot of questions!
So I thought my best course of action is to now show you exactly HOW to make the peanut butter cup stuffed cookies, since those are definitely the ones I received the most questions about.
It’s not that stuffing a chocolate chip cookie with anything is a new concept, it’s just that I was extremely unsatisfied with any recipe that I came across.
Look at the picture below.
Notice a difference between those and all the other stuffed cookie pictures?
NO LUMP! No bump! No weird shaped cookie.
They look like large chocolate chip cookies, until the unsuspecting victim lucky duck bites into them. I was so happy when these came out of the oven!
Another picture, because I just can’t get over the perfection I achieved.
Eeeek!
They are also cooked all the way around, no gooeyness. The other problem I noticed with other recipes is that the “treat” sinks its way to the bottom of the cookie, every single time.
This had the very large peanut butter cups completely centered! I didn’t want the peanut butter cup just pushed into the top of a cookie, I wanted a hidden treat.
A good rule of thumb is to use very good chocolate chips. If you are going to spend the money on those peanut butter cups, you should indulge in decent chocolate as well. I adore The Decadent chocolate chip from President’s Choice. It is a semi-sweet chocolate with such a unique flavor and the quality is apparent in how they bake up, which is fantastic.
Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups! I grabbed a package of Snack Size to use, 15 in all. And to clarify even further the questions I have been asked, these are NOT mini’s. These are just snack packs with one whole normal sized peanut butter cup in them, all I could find at the store at the time for bulk amounts.
First you need to whip up my Perfect Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe.
- 2 1/4 cups of all purpose flour
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 cup of butter
- 3/4 cup of packed brown sugar
- 3/4 cup of granulated sugar
- 1 1/2 tsp vanilla
- 2 eggs
- 2 cups of semi-sweet chocolate chips
- Kick the tires and light the fires to 350 degrees.
- Cream together your butter and sugar until it’s light and fluffy. Add in the eggs and vanilla, mixing thoroughly. Beat in the flour, baking soda and salt.
- When that is done, fold in the two cups of chocolate chips by hand, and prepare to put them on some parchment paper lined cookie sheets.
Voila! This is the only recipe you should use to make stuffed cookies, using a very small of butter in the dough is the real secret here, no melting dough, it holds the “stuffing” firmly in place. There are other chocolate chip cookie recipes out there, but this is tweaked especially for this purpose.
Take a scoop of cookie dough, flatten it slightly to about 1/2 cm thickness and place the peanut butter cup on top.
Take another large scoop and place it on top, then mold and pinch the edges together like you would a perogie or a dumpling. The top of the cookie in your hand will be lovely and flat, thus turning into the bottom!
The reverse shape of the peanut butter cup lends to a great cookie shape, the top is wider and flatter than the bottom, so inverting it straight onto the cookie sheet makes for a perfect cookie.
Because I know it helps readers like myself, I took a measurement of the cookies and most were 2 1/2 inches wide.
I know. I am a geek, I can’t help it.
I always leave a lot more space when trying out something new on a cookie sheet, but I didn’t need to in the slightest. These are not supposed to spread out and they don’t.
Pop those babies into the 350 degree oven for 15-17 minutes, until they are golden brown and ready to come out.
And then they look like this.
Can I again mention the no huge lumps and bumps and sheer cookie perfection or is it just annoying at this point in time?
I can’t help it, I get excited when recipes turn out so fantastic and I just can’t wait to share with everyone, I am impatient like a child at Christmas.
These are large cookies for sure, but a peanut butter cup is large so this is what will happen.
How large is large, you ask?
Well, just wait while I get out my measuring tape, of course!
These cookies ended up being 3.5 inches wide, meaning only .5 inch spread in each direction, an incredibly small distance for that amount of dough.
And in proportion to my hand, which I would like to think is a normal, nice sized hand. So just large enough not to be crazy.
I think that no matter how hot it is, these cookies should be on your list of Must Bake Now! I do apologize for coming up with these right smack in the middle of summer weather.
I am pretty sure that Pandora’s Recipe Box has simply flown open at this point and more chocolate chip cookie recipes are forthcoming. Who wants a chocolate chip cookie recipe that has the cookie stuffed with bacon??
Just kidding, the bacon thing is so over.
Maybe.
Love,
The Peanut Butter Cups Make Me Do Crazy Things Magpie
