Peanut Butter Cookies with Mini Peanut Butter Cups

It seems like lately when I look at recipes to make, I have been gravitating to bar cookies. I try not to be too repetitive, so I didn’t want to go to the first recipe I came across. Instead, I decided I would use up an ingredient that I had in the cupboard: mini peanut butter cups. I had purchased these at Trader Joe’s a while back. I didn’t know what I would make with them, but I knew I could come up with something.

I don’t usually innovate recipes all that much, but it is something that I’d like to work on. I had a couple of ideas about what I wanted to do and I did a couple of searches on the web to see if that could spark any ideas. I originally wanted to make some sort of peanut butter cookie with cocoa powder, so the cookie would be chocolaty and so would the peanut butter cups. I couldn’t quite find a recipe that I wanted to use, so I defaulted to a regular peanut butter cookie.

If you don’t have a Trader Joe’s near you, you could always use chopped up peanut butter cups or even chocolate chips (but that wouldn’t be quite the same). I am so pleased with how they turned out. They are a basic, hearty cookie that is just a little bit special. The mini peanut butter cups are soft and gooey and add to the richness of the cookie. I doubled the recipe, which made quite a few, so you may want to stick with the original quantities in the recipe.

1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1 egg
1-1/4 cups flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup mini peanut butter cups

Preheat oven to 375°. Line two baking sheets with silicone baking mats.

In a large mixer bowl, cream the butter, peanut butter and sugars until light. Add the egg and mix until fluffy. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add this to the creamed butter mixture and mix in low until combined. Stir in the mini peanut butter cups by hand.

Drop cookie dough by teaspoonfuls onto the prepared baking sheets. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until golden brown. Allow to cool for several minutes on the baking sheet before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Recipe adapted from http://southernfood.about.com/od/chocchipcookies/r/blbb329.htm