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This homemade Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups recipe will satisfy your peanut butter cravings in just minutes, and they taste just like the real thing!
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We love peanut butter cups in our family, and take them quite seriously. This homemade Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups recipe came from our grandma, who made them for us for years. The layer of peanut butter filling has the same creamy texture as the candy you buy at the store, with rich, sweet chocolate on the outside. But these taste even better, because they’re homemade! They’re perfect as a special Halloween treat, or to keep on hand in the freezer for when your sweet tooth hits.
Ingredients in Homemade Peanut Butter Cups
This delicious, no-bake treat only needs six pantry ingredients. You’ll find yourself making these all the time! Here’s what you need:
- Graham crackers – use a food processor to crush the crackers into fine crumbs.
- Powdered sugar – make sure to sift the powdered sugar before adding to the ingredients.
- Butter – use unsalted butter to better control the sodium in the recipe.
- Peanut butter – Both creamy or crunchy nut butter works great.
- Chocolate chips – you can use any kind of chocolate you like: semi-sweet, dark chocolate, milk chocolate, even white chocolate chips would be delicious.
How to make these treats look like Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups
They may look fancy, but making these into cute cups couldn’t be easier.
- Place cupcake liners into a mini muffin tin, or regular muffin pan, depending on how large you want your homemade peanut butter cups.
- Using a paint brush (I like to use a flat brush, about an inch or so wide) paint melted chocolate on the inside of each cupcake liner until about halfway up.
- Place them in the refrigerator to cool.
- Then, put a ball of peanut butter cup mixture into each cup (see recipe for instructions below) and top with more melted chocolate.
- The amount of chocolate needed tends to vary each time, so keep a few extra chocolate chips on hand if you need a bit more.
A Quicker Method for Homemade Reese’s PB Cups
If you don’t have a lot of time or patience to create the “cups” in the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, you can make things a bit easier on your self. Here’s how:
- You can make these “fondue” or “buckeye” style by first rolling the peanut butter mixture into balls.
- Next, dip them directly into the melted chocolate.
- Then, place them on wax paper to cool and harden. You will get the exact same taste and it’ll only take you about five minutes!
Variations
- Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups: Use dark chocolate for the outer layer
- White Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups: Switch to white chocolate for a sweeter and creamier version.
- Cookie Dough Filling: Incorporate edible cookie dough for a delicious cookie-candy hybrid.
- Salted Caramel Peanut Butter Cups: Add a layer of salted caramel on top of the peanut butter filling and sprinkle the top with some coarse sea salt.
- Coconut Peanut Butter Cups: Mix shredded coconut into the peanut butter for a tropical twist.
- Nutella Filled Cups: Swap peanut butter for Nutella for a hazelnut-chocolate twist.
- Toffee Crunch Peanut Butter Cups: Mix crushed toffee bits into the peanut butter for added crunch.
- S’mores Peanut Butter Cups: Layer peanut butter with marshmallow whip and crushed graham crackers.
- Mini M&Ms or Reese’s Pieces Filled Cups: Add Mini M&Ms or Reese’s Pieces to the peanut butter filling for a crunchy (and delicious) surprise
Frequently Asked Questions About Homemade Peanut Butter Cups
While this homemade peanut butter cups recipe calls for chocolate chips, you can use chocolate melts instead. It won’t be quite as soft as the chocolate on the store-bought brand, but they’ll still taste chocolatey and delicious!
Once the chocolate shell has hardened, there is no need to refrigerate these peanut butter cups. You can store them at room temperature until ready to eat! But, if you’re like me and you happen to love cold chocolate, pop a few in the fridge or freezer in an airtight container. Perhaps hide them behind the veggies so nobody but you knows they’re there!
Yes! Almond butter or cashew butter are delicious options for this homemade treat.
Read Next:Halloween Candy Bark
More Reese’s Recipes
If you love the taste of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and candies, check out these delicious recipes!
- Really Reese’s Cookies – With three different types of Reese’s candies, these are REALLY REESE’S Cookies! Chocolate and peanut butter in every delicious bite.
- Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge Swirl – This fudge is so easy to make and it is incredibly delicious! It tasted like a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup in fudge form.
- Peanut Butter Cup Rice Krispie Treats – It’s so easy to turn a traditional Rice Krispie Treats into Peanut Butter Cup Rice Krispie Treats. Creamy peanut butter and mini Reese’s cups make it an extra special treat!
- Candy Bar Hot Chocolate – You’ve got to try this Reese’s Hot Chocolate. It is amazing how a little peanut butter can give a creamier, richer taste to hot cocoa!
- Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Cake – This cake is so fun! It is a round cake that looks and tastes just like a giant Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup!
Homemade Reeses Peanut Butter Cups
Video
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup graham crackers crushed
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 6 tablespoons butter
- 9 ounces peanut butter either creamy or crunchy is fine
- 4 tablespoons butter divided
- 12 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips you may want to have a little extra on hand just in case
Instructions
- In a medium-sized bowl, combine graham cracker crumbs and powdered sugar until well blended. Set aside.
- In a microwave-safe measuring cup, heat 6 Tablespoons of butter and peanut butter together in microwave for 15 second increments until melted. Stir until combined and pour over graham cracker mixture. Continue to stir until well combined. Set aside.
- Melt half of the chocolate chips with 2 tablespoons of butter in a microwave safe bowl in the microwave for 15 second increments (stirring each time) until chocolate is melted.
- Place cupcake liners in cupcake tin (mini or regular depending on what size peanut butter cups you want to make– makes about 36 mini cups or 18 full-sized cups).
- Using a paint brush (I used a flat brush about 1/2" wide), "paint" each cupcake liner with melted chocolate. Be sure to evenly coat the bottom and half way up each cup (if using the "mini" cupcake liners). If you are using full-size cupcake liners paint about ⅓ of the way up each cup. Tip: You don't need to paint the chocolate super thick, just enough so you don't see any of the liner underneath.Place in the refrigerator to cool for about 5 minutes or until chocolate hardens.
- Press about 1 teaspoon of graham cracker mixture in each mini cup (about 1 Tablespoon for regular-sized cups) making sure the top is somewhat flat (it doesn't need to be perfect). Just make sure you don't go above where you "painted" the chocolate on the cup.
- Add remaining chocolate chips to remaining melted chocolate in the microwave-safe bowl and melt together with remaining 2 tablespoons butter (stirring every 15 seconds).Spoon a little chocolate over each peanut butter cup until the peanut butter filling is completely covered (you can lightly shake or tap the cupcake pan to even out the chocolate over the filling). You want the top of the peanut butter cup to look completely flat.
- Place in refrigerator or cool area until chocolate hardens, then serve!
Notes
- Place cupcake liners into a mini cupcake pan, or regular cupcake pan, depending on how large you want your homemade peanut butter cups.
- Using a paint brush (I like to use a flat brush, about an inch or so wide) paint melted chocolate on the inside of each cupcake liner until about halfway up.
- Place them in the refrigerator to cool.
- Then, put a ball of peanut butter cup mixture into each cup (see recipe for instructions below) and top with more melted chocolate.
- The amount of chocolate needed tends to vary each time, so keep a few extra chocolate chips on hand if you need a bit more.
Nutrition Information
Question could I substitute shortbread cookies for the Graham crackers?
I haven’t tried that, but I think it would be okay!
I made these for my family and they were so fun to make! If anyone likes making homemade edibles, incorporate your cannabutter into the chocolate or peanut butter mixture (or both) and it melts and mixes beautifully.
What’s happening in “Step 3” picture? It looks like PB and chocolate melting stirred together…buuuut…that’s not in the recipe….
It is butter and chocolate mixed together!
Wow!! I made these and they are indeed better than Reese’s! The peanut butter filling is absolutely delicious….GIVE THESE A TRY, you will not be disappointed!
I’m confused. The recipe calls for “4 tbs butter divided” bit in the directions it says melt 6 tbs of butter to mix in peanut butter abs then calls for another 2 tbs to mix in the chocolate. So, unless I’m missing something, that’s a total of 8 tbs. Which is the typo?
Butter is listed twice in the ingredient list – once for the peanut butter filling and one for the chocolate.
You add 2 tbsp butter to chocolate to melt it, two separate times…. =4
Looks like you melt 2T of butter with 6oz of the the chocolate chips in a bowl. Then in step 5 you do the remaining 6oz chocolate chips with the remaining 2T of butter in the same bowl that you used. It was a little confusing to me too. It seems you could melt all the chocolate chips and butter in one step. Oh well 🙂 this was delicious though. I omitted some of the powdered sugar though.
I know this is a “family friendly” bog, but I swapped out normal butter with my home made medicated budder, and these turned out AMAZING. The pb & chocolate flavors were just perfect for balancing out the herbal flavors from the “medication”
Definitely my new go-to when I’m tired of the typical baked goods!
Would the filling for this hold together if I scooped it and rolled it into balls and then dipped in chocolate?
We haven’t tried that, but it sounds yummy! Let us know how it works out if you try it!
Didn’t have Graham crackers so I used crushed corn flakes. They were perfect.
I used semi sweet chocolate chips but I would suggest that you use milk chocolate chips because semi sweet made it kind of bitter otherwise the recipe was good
Awesome!! It’s my favorite Reeses Peanut Butter Cups recipe!
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I just made these homemade Reese’s peanut butter cups and they were absolutely delicious! I love that I can control the ingredients and make them a little healthier than the store-bought version. The recipe was easy to follow and the cups turned out perfectly. I will definitely be making these again and again. Thank you for sharing this recipe!
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They’re good! But I didn’t get a wow factor on taste. Like the eye roll when something is so delicious. Once they were put together the peanut butter just didn’t seem right with Graham in it. I may try again using milk chocolate and using a bar vs chocolate chips. Fun to make though!
Can you use coconut oil instead of butter for this recipe? I know they are 1:1 with each other. I just wanted to double check
Yes you can! It might change the flavor a little bit, but if you like coconut that should be fine!
Taste like the Reeses Peanut Butter Cups you buy in the store. Easy to make. I made them exactly as the recipe said. I used Ghirardelli dark chocolate melts instead of chocolate chips because that was what I had on hand. The chocolate was harder but still very good. Next time I make them I will crush my Graham crackers finer. I crushed them like you would for a pie crust, so If you like the Crunchy Reeses Peanut Butter cups than crush them for a pie crust. I had some filling left over and put in the refrigerator – plan to warm it up and make more cups another day. Will let you know if they are as good as the ones I just made.
Are you using regular peanut butter or unsweetened peanut butter for this recipe?
Regular!
Try crushing Nutter Butter cookies instead of graham crackers.. put a little carmel in the bottom of the cup, before the peanut butter mixture… Your welcome!!
Yum!
Really good I’m Irish we don’t have Graham crackers so I used digestive biscuits the only thing is adding butter splits the chocolate and makes it harder to spread
I just made these homemade Reese’s peanut butter cups and they were absolutely delicious! I love that I can control the ingredients and make them a little healthier than the store-bought version. The recipe was easy to follow and the cups turned out perfectly. I will definitely be making these again and again. Thank you for sharing this recipe!good way