Featuring the classic pairing of peanut butter and chocolate, our recipe for Peanut Butter and Chocolate Dessert Bars has a layer of rich, sweetened peanut butter topped a delicious chocolate ganache. This recipe is a “no bake” recipe, and all you need is a microwave for melting butter and chocolate.
Chocolate and peanut butter are a divine combination. These two delicious flavors are a classic pairing. This combination of nutty peanut butter and rich, decadent chocolate is what makes the taste of snacks like Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups a favorite all around the world. This candy is so popular that it generates more than two billion dollars in sales every single year, and it is the most popular candy sold in the United States.
Peanut Butter and Chocolate Dessert Bars Recipe
With only five ingredients, our recipe for Peanut Butter and Chocolate Dessert Bars come together in a snap. If you want a delicious bar cookie to share with friends or to just have on hand when a craving for something sweet shows up, this recipe is exactly the one that you need. Using items that many people already have in the pantry, why not whip up a batch of these Peanut Butter and Chocolate Dessert Bars today?
Equipment
- 9-Inch Square Baking Pan
- Zip Top Baggie
- Rolling Pin
- Microwave Safe Bowl
- Wire whisk
- Rubber Spatula
Ingredients
- ½ cup Butter
- 1¼ cups Peanut Butter
- 6 pcs Rectangular Graham Crackers
- 1 cup Powdered Sugar
- 1 cup Chocolate Chips
Instructions
- Line a nine-inch square pan with aluminum foil by first flipping the pan upside down on the countertop. Press a sheet of aluminum foil around the pan and gently lift it off of the pan. Flip the pan right side up and set the molded piece of aluminum foil into the bottom of the pan and fold any excess around the pan. Set this aside.
- Put the graham crackers into a heavy-duty quart-sized zip-top baggie, press out as much air as you can, and seal it up. Use a rolling pin or a meat mallet to crush the graham crackers into coarse crumbs. You want to crush them so that there are no large chunks of graham crackers remaining. Set the baggie of graham cracker crumbs aside until needed.
- Using a microwave-safe bowl, put the butter in it and microwave it for about thirty seconds. Stir the butter and, if it is not completely melted, put it back in the microwave for ten to fifteen seconds at a time.
- Use a wire whisk to blend 1 cup of the peanut butter with the melted butter. Using a wooden spoon, stir in the graham crackers and the powdered sugar. Stir until everything is fully blended.
- Press this mixture into the bottom of the foil-lined pan, spreading it into an even layer, and using a rubber spatula to scrape out the bowl. Put this into the fridge while you move on to making the chocolate topping.
- Use a paper towel to wipe out the residue in the mixing bowl. Put the chocolate chips and the remaining ¼ cup of peanut butter in the bottom of the mixing bowl. Microwave this for about thirty seconds.
- Stir with a rubber spatula. If the chocolate chips are not melted, return them to the microwave for another twenty seconds. Stir again. When the chocolate chips are melted, you should stir the mixture until it is smooth and creamy.
- Take the reserved peanut butter bottom layer out of the refrigerator, and scrape the chocolate out of the bowl and onto the top of it. Smooth it gently into an even layer.
- Put the pan into the refrigerator uncovered for two hours. Remove the pan from the refrigerator and lift the peanut butter and chocolate dessert bars out of the pan onto a cutting board with aluminum foil. Peel the foil from the large chunk of bars and cut them into one-inch squares. Store the bars in a tightly sealed container in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.
Notes
In 1928, the H.B. Reese company sold the first peanut butter cup candies. Henry Burnette Reese invented the peanut butter cup and began selling them to stores in his Pennsylvania town. While Reese created plenty of other kinds of sweet treats, during World War 2, he struggled to find ingredients for all of his other candies, so he stopped making the others in favor of focusing solely on the peanut butter cup, his most popular item.
The original name of this tasty confection was “Penny Cups” because the candies cost one cent each. In 1963, after the passing of H. B. Reese, the Hersey Company purchased the H.B. Reese Company from the descendants of the original owner. At this time they changed the name of this popular treat. The Hersey company paid over $20 million for the candy company.
Our recipe for Peanut Butter and Chocolate Dessert Bars is very similar to that of a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup. The bottom layer is simply graham cracker crumbs mixed with peanut butter and powdered sugar. The topping is a tasty chocolate ganache that is a mixture of more peanut butter and rich chocolate chips.
For this recipe, you can use either crunchy peanut butter or smooth peanut butter. For the chocolate, you can use semi-sweet or milk chocolate chips. If you want to lower the calorie count of this tasty snack, you can replace the powdered sugar with stevia or another calorie-free sweetener.
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