My Cup Runneth Over - with Hope and Peanut Butter!

Feed Me Friday - Feeding your Body and Soul!

First, HOPE for your soul - this poem is for the lost and the found.

Second, for your body - Reese's peanut butter cup knock offs. If you make either of these recipes, I want to hear from you!

Since Easter is right around the corner, and my FAVORITE thing to find in my Easter basket is a Reese's Peanut Butter egg (YUM), I am sharing a healthier, but just as YUMMY (or I wouldn't eat it!) version. This recipe can be found in the Street Chicks Cookbook (available on our website - just click the link to your right) and is courtesy of The Nourishing Gourmet, Kim Hams.

INGREDIENTS:

• 3/4 cup peanut butter
• 2 Tablespoons honey
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/4 cup coconut oil
• 1/3 cup chopped peanuts
• 4 oz semi-sweet chocolate pieces (which is 1/2 cup)
• 2-4 Tablespoons honey

1. In a small bowl combine peanut butter, coconut oil, vanilla, 2 tablespoons of honey and nuts. Mix until well combined.
2. Drop by heaping teaspoons into mini cupcake pans and place in freezer for 15-20 minutes while you prepare the chocolate topping.
3. Place chocolate pieces into the top of a double boiler (or a heatproof bowl that fits on top of a pot you have) along with 2-4 tablespoons of honey.
4. Place about 2" of water in the pan and the heatproof bowl on top of the water. Bring water to a simmer and allow the chocolate to melt. Remove bowl from the double boiler. ****(I just melted the chocolate in the microwave - just remember to only microwave for a few seconds at a time, like 10-15, stirring before adding more time, or you will burn your chocolate! YUCK!)****
5. Drop chocolate by spoonfulls over the peanut butter mixture and place back into the freezer for about 20 minutes. Take out and use a butter knife to pop them out of the cupcake pan.

Store in fridge or freezer.

But who needs to store them?  JUST EAT 'EM! If you're feeling generous share with friends!

Here is my experience making these and I want to start by saying that they really did taste GOOD!! 

First, I don't understand why there is so much coconut oil in the peanut butter mixture. If any of you can explain that, please comment and let me in on it. It made the peanut butter mixture kind of lumpy, so I had to work those out with a spatula.  Also, once they are 'set' in the freezer, they seemed to melt very quickly when I took them out.

I used a mini cupcake pan with 12 cups, and this mixture filled each to the brim without any leftover. I was going to try and just put drop fulls on waxed paper or use some alternative to the mini cupcake pan, but the peanut butter mixture is very thin and would not have held up on waxed paper. You could probably find some other container to make them in if you don't have the mini cupcake pan - might even work to put it in a 8x8 square pan and cut them.

Second, I put honey in the chocolate, but I don't think it is necessary. I have made many things dipped in chocolate, and just us plain chocolate.

When I took them out of the freezer, I choose to remove them from the pan, and dunk in chocolate. That did not work at all!  The peanut butter cup started to melt in the warm chocolate and the chocolate would not 'stick' to it at all, I think because of the coconut oil. It made them slippery.

 So, then I just put some on the top and it looked like a mini cupcake. That worked pretty well, but I wanted MORE chocolate, so I tried to turn the peanut butter cup upside down, so the larger part was on the bottom, and smaller part on top. I was hoping to put chocolate on it and have it run down the sides like a glaze.

Once again, the chocolate just wanted to slide off. Partly due to the fact that they were melting, partly due to the coconut oil.  So I gave up on that idea, and just put a dab of chocolate on the top.

Once again, these were DELICIOUS dispite the fact they didn't look so good. I'm glad I was not planning on thaking them somewhere!

For those of you who don't care about having a healthy alternative, this reminded me of making Buckeyes (as in Ohio State Buckeyes). For those of you that didn't grow up in Ohio and don't know what those are, they are peanut butter balls dipped in chocolate to look like a buckeye.

buckeyes

You could also form the peanut butter mixture into a small egg shape and it would be like a Reese's Easter egg!


Recipe courtesy of Jiff







Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups Jif® Creamy Peanut Butter
  Or 1 1/2 cups Smucker's® Natural Creamy Peanut Butter
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 to 4 cups powdered sugar
• 2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 2 tablespoons Crisco® All-Vegetable Shortening

Directions

1. Combine peanut butter, butter, vanilla and salt in large bowl. Beat with an electric mixer on LOW until blended. Add 2 cups powdered sugar, beating until blended. Beat in additional powdered sugar until mixture, when shaped into a ball, will stay on a toothpick. Shape into 1-inch balls. Refrigerate.
2. Place chocolate chips and shortening in microwave-safe bowl. Microwave on MEDIUM for 30 seconds. Stir. Repeat until mixture is smooth. Reheat as needed while coating peanut butter balls.
3. Insert toothpick in peanut butter ball. Dip 3/4 of ball into chocolate, leaving top uncovered to resemble a buckeye. Remove excess. Place on wax paper-lined tray. Remove toothpick. Smooth over holes. Refrigerate until firm.