Peanut Butter Cup Cookies Recipe (2024)

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Peanut butter cup cookies are homemade peanut butter cookies, baked in a mini muffin tin and stuffed with a mini Reese’s peanut butter cup.

Chocolate and peanut butter are a winning flavor combination and a family favorite in our house. We make Frosted Peanut Butter Rice Krispie Treats, Peanut Butter Balls with Rice Krispies, Chocolate Peanut Butter No Bake Cookies, and these tasty Reese’s peanut butter cup cookies at least once every holiday baking season. And several times throughout the year as well.

I mean does it get any better than homemade peanut butter cookies stuffed with peanut butter cups?

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Plus, I love how easy these Reese’s cookies are to make, all in one bowl. No need to combine dry ingredients and wet ingredients separately for this quick and easy cookie recipe!

For another easy Reese’s dessert try my Reese’s peanut butter cup dip recipe.

These mini peanut butter cup cookies will be the star of your Christmas cookie tray, although the delicious cookies are perfect for any time of the year and for any occasion.

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Unlike most cookie recipes, this peanut butter cookie recipe doesn’t call for any butter or flour.

Surprising I know, but trust me on this–they are absolutely delicious!

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Table of Contents

Ingredients

This section includes ingredient notes and substitution options. Get all measurements, ingredients, and instructions in the printable recipe card at the end of this post.

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  • Mini peanut butter cups– I used Reese’s Mini Peanut Butter Cups
  • Creamy peanut butter– I recommend using a conventional peanut butter here since they are typically thicker than natural peanut butters. The thicker peanut butter is necessary to hold up the shape of the cookie.
  • Granulated sugar
  • Light brown sugar
  • Baking soda
  • Large eggs
  • Pure vanilla extract– if you are using imitation vanilla increase the amount to 2 teaspoons
  • Fine sea salt – regular table salt works too

Kitchen Supplies

  1. Measuring cups and spoons
  2. Mini muffin tins (you will need 2 tins)
  3. Large mixing bowl
  4. Mixing spoon or hand-held mixer
  5. Medium cookie scoop
  6. Wire cooling rack

How to Make

This section shows you how to make the recipe with step-by-step photos and instructions. For the full printable recipe, see the recipe card below.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the peanut butter, granulated sugar, light brown sugar, and baking soda. Mix in the eggs, the vanilla extract, and salt.

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Use a medium cookie scoop to portion out equal scoops of batter and roll each scoop into a ball. Place 1 cookie dough ball into each cup of a mini muffin tin.

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Bake as directed in the recipe card below.

When you remove the cookies from the oven immediately press a mini peanut butter cup into the center of each cookie.

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Place the muffin tin on top of a wire cooling rack and allow the cookies to cool completely before carefully removing them from the pan.

Tip: You may find it helpful to a butter knife to gently separate the side of cookie cups from the tin.

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Storage

Room Temperature: Place the cookies in an airtight container and store at room temperature for up to 4 days.

Freezer: Place baked and cooled cookie cups on a baking sheet and freeze for 1 hour before placing in a freezer bag or other freezer-safe container. The cookies will stay fresh in the freezer for up to 4 weeks. Thaw the cookies or eat them frozen!

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Tips & Variations

  • You can replace the Reese’s with another small candy. Try the recipe with Rolos, caramels, mini Snickers, mini Milky Ways, mini Butterfingers, Hershey Kisses, etc…
  • Prep the dough ahead of time and freeze for up to 3 months. Then simply thaw, bake, and add your mini peanut butter cups.
  • For a short cut you can use a bag of peanut butter cookie mix or ready-to-bake peanut butter cookie dough.

More Must-Try Cookie Recipes

  • Sugar Cookie Bars
  • Chocolate Chip Air Fryer Cookies
  • Peanut Butter Cornflake Cookies
  • Easy Chocolate Chip Cookies
  • Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars
  • Peanut Butter Blossoms

Recipe

4.58 from 42 votes

Peanut Butter Cup Cookies

Author: Jaclyn

Prep: 15 minutes mins

Cook: 10 minutes mins

Total: 25 minutes mins

Peanut butter cup cookies are homemade peanut butter cookies, baked in a mini muffin tin and stuffed with a mini Reese's peanut butter cup.

Ingredients

  • 1 ½ cups creamy peanut butter
  • 1 cup granulated sugar
  • ½ cup light brown sugar packed
  • ½ teaspoon baking soda
  • 2 large eggs room temperature
  • 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
  • ¼ teaspoon fine sea salt
  • 34 mini peanut butter cups unwrapped

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 350° Fahrenheit.

  • In a large mixing bowl, combine the peanut butter, granulated sugar, light brown sugar, and baking soda. Mix in the eggs, the vanilla extract, and salt.

  • Use a medium cookie scoop to portion out equal scoops of batter and roll each scoop into a ball. Place 1 cookie dough ball into each cup of a mini muffin tin.

  • Bake the cookies for about 10 minutes, or until set and the tops are beginning to crack. When you remove the cookies from the oven immediately press a mini peanut butter cup into the center of each cookie.

  • Place the muffin tin on top of a wire cooling rack and allow the cookies to cool completely before carefully removing them from the pan.

Notes

Storage: Place the cookies in an airtight container and store at room temperature for up to 4 days.

To freeze: Place baked and cooled cookies on a baking sheet and freeze for 1 hour before placing in a freezer bag or other freezer-safe container. The cookies will stay fresh in the freezer for up to 4 weeks. Thaw the cookies or eat them frozen!

Or prep the dough ahead of time and freeze for up to 3 months. Then simply thaw, bake, and add your mini peanut butter cups.

    Nutrition

    Serving: 1g | Calories: 122kcal

    Peanut Butter Cup Cookies Recipe (11)

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    Peanut Butter Cup Cookies Recipe (12)
    Peanut Butter Cup Cookies Recipe (2024)

    FAQs

    Can you bake with Reese's cups? ›

    The result is the best chocolate peanut butter cup cookies! The star of the show is definitely Reese's peanut butter cups! You not only fold them into the cookie dough but you add a few extra on the top once you pull the cookies out of the oven…just to ensure there is an abundance of chocolate peanut butter goodness.

    Why are my 3 ingredient peanut butter cookies falling apart? ›

    There are a few reasons why your cookies are falling apart. The wrong ratio of ingredients, such as too little sugar or peanut butter will make them fall apart. The wrong type of peanut butter may cause them to fall apart. Or using old eggs may create crumbly cookies.

    How do you keep peanut butter cookies from falling apart? ›

    Here are some tips for making the best peanut butter cookies:
    1. Use room temperature ingredients. This will help the dough come together more easily.
    2. Don't overmix the dough. Overmixing can make the cookies tough.
    3. Chill the dough before baking. ...
    4. Bake the cookies until they are just golden brown.
    Aug 8, 2022

    Why are my peanut butter cookies dry and crumbly? ›

    If you're wanting to use natural (no sugar added) peanut butter, the cookies will be less sweet and they will likely spread out more. Using natural peanut butter will change the structure and texture of the cookies. Why are my cookies dry and crumbly? This is most likely a classic case of using too much flour.

    Do Reese's peanut butter cups melt? ›

    Reese's chocolate-covered peanut butter cups will melt to create a peanut-flavored base for a chocolate sauce or dessert filling. The melted Reese's peanut butter cups can also be used as a chocolaty spread for toast. Because chocolate burns easily, it's simplest to melt it in a ...

    Why do Reese's peanut butter cups taste different? ›

    The Bottom Line

    Even though all Reese's shapes are made the exact same way with the exact same recipe, the temperature at which the chocolates hang out in during shipping could play a factor into how fresh each shape tastes.

    Why do my peanut butter cookies taste weird? ›

    Your other source of fat should be butter, not shortening. Butter will make your cookies taste buttery; shortening will make them taste suspiciously vacant, like Katy Perry's voice post-autotune. Yes, shortening yields chewier cookies than butter does, because butter contains water and shortening doesn't.

    What happens if you don't flatten peanut butter cookies? ›

    If you don't flatten the cookies first, then the fork does double duty – it performs both functions. One very subtle result of creating the pattern is that the little tips of dough bake up crisper than the rest of the cookie, giving you both a bit of additional texture and deeper taste where the dough is more baked.

    Why are my peanut butter cookies always hard? ›

    Why did my peanut butter cookies turn out hard? This is most likely to happen from over-baking your cookies. Make sure to take them out of the oven when they're still a bit soft in the middles, that way they can finish cooking on their cookie sheets outside the oven.

    Should you refrigerate peanut butter cookie dough before baking? ›

    Chill your cookie dough! The dough is extremely soft due to the creamy peanut butter, eggs, and butter and if it's not cold going into the oven, the cookies will spread all over your baking sheet. I chilled this cookie dough for 24 hours and my cookies were soft, thick perfection.

    What kind of peanut butter is best for baking cookies? ›

    Peanut butter: Creamy peanut butter is ideal for this recipe because crunchy peanut butter creates an overly crumbly cookie. You can use processed peanut butter such as Jif or Skippy, or natural-style peanut butter.

    Why do you put fork marks in peanut butter cookies? ›

    So it looks like that there are utilitarian reasons for the cross-hatching—to allow for even cooking—but it might have been passed along for nearly a hundred years for primarily aesthetic reasons, where the cross-hatching is more to identify the cookies as peanut butter ones, rather than to cook them well.

    What happens if you add too much peanut butter to peanut butter cookies? ›

    Too much peanut butter leads to dry cookies

    The protein in peanut butter may also be to blame — it typically adds structure to baked goods but can also retain water, leading to a dry consistency.

    How do you moisten peanut butter cookie dough? ›

    Dry – “Dry” or “Crumbly” dough is a product of over-mixing or using too much of any ingredient during the mixing process. This can be reversed by adding one to two tablespoons of liquid (water, milk or softened butter) to your mix.

    What ingredient keeps cookies soft? ›

    Eggs, particularly egg yolks. Eggs work to make your cookies soft in two ways: They add a ton of moisture, and the proteins add structure that prevents spreading. Cake flour instead of all-purpose flour. Low in protein and high in moisture, cake flour is used to leaven all sorts of baked goods.

    Are Reese's Pieces and Reese's Peanut Butter Cups the same thing? ›

    Reese's Pieces are a product extension of the Reese's Peanut Butter Cups line; they were designed to capitalize on the success of the chocolate-covered peanut butter cups, though unlike the cups, they have no chocolate.

    Is Reese's peanut butter the same as the cups? ›

    Originally Answered: Why does Reese's peanut butter not actually taste like the peanut butter in their candy? Because it's not the same, there is no peanut butter in Reeses Peanut Butter cups. There are peanuts, sugars and salt in the candy but the process and amounts are different.

    What is so special about Reese's Peanut Butter Cups? ›

    1. Reese's product offer a delightful combination of sweet chocolate and salty peanut butter. 2. Many people grew up enjoying Reese's candies, creating a strong sense of nostalgia and fond memories associated with them.

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