Homemade Peanut Butter Cups

Welcome to Taste Creations Monday! My blogging friends and I get together the first Monday of every month to share recipes. Today, we are all sharing candy recipes. I adore peanut butter cups, so of course, I opted to make homemade peanut butter cups! Peanut butter cups are fairly easy to make—it’s basically a no bake recipe; you just have to melt the chocolate!

Be sure to click on the links for my friends’ recipes at the bottom of this post! I decided to make mini peanut butter cups – I probably should have used Peanut Butter Cup Recipe

(Recipe of FIfteen Spatulas)

Ingredients

16 oz. semisweet chocolate chopped, or in chip form

1/2 cup creamy natural peanut butter

2 tbsp butter softened

1.75 oz confectioner’s sugar, by weight (1/4 cup+2 tbsp, measured), sifted

Instructions

Line a standard 12 cup muffin tin with paper cupcake liners. (This is where I modified the recipe a little. I filled mini candy liners instead.)

Melt half the chocolate either in a double boiler (the safer method) or in the microwave (the slightly more dangerous, but easier method). I used the latter. Place the chocolate into a microwave-safe bowl, and microwave in 20 second intervals, about 3-4 times, stirring after each interval, until melted. Make absolutely sure not to overcook the chocolate, or it will seize and turn grainy.

Distribute the melted chocolate into the 12 muffin tins, only barely filling the bottom of each cup. If the chocolate does not lie flat, drop the pan repeatedly on the counter, and it will flatten and smooth itself out. Place the pan in the freezer for 15 minutes, until the layer is firm.

In the meantime, whip the peanut butter, butter, and confectioner’s sugar together in your mixer for about 1 minute until creamy and light. Taste it and make sure the sweetness is to your liking. Place small tablespoons of the peanut butter mixture into each cup, then drop the pan repeatedly on the counter again, so the layer is flattened out. Place in the freezer for 15 minutes, until the second layer is firm.

Melt the last 1/2 lb of chocolate, and portion small spoonfuls into the cups, one cup at a time, immediately dropping the pan repeatedly on the counter to flatten each cup. The chill from the peanut butter layer (because it was just in the freezer) will harden up that top layer very quickly, so you must flatten out the tops immediately after you pour the chocolate into each cup. Place the tray in the freezer for 15 minutes to set the top layer of chocolate.

Enjoy the peanut butter cups at room temperature. If you store them in the fridge or freezer, the chocolate will be more firm.