(21 votes, average: 4.33 out of 5)
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Ah, holiday baking. The delicious smells, the smiles as the kids decorate cookies, the powdered sugar smeared on your face and some unnamed dried syrup on your shirt that you can’t identify and the mountains of dirty dishes from eleven hours of baking that will sit there for two whole days because if you keep your flour covered butt in this kitchen ONE MORE SECOND, the kids will think you are a gingerbread man and begin to frost you. But it’s worth it…because is there anything better than a holiday cookie? How about a warm holiday cookie from the oven? How about a warm holiday cookie from the oven with peanut butter inside? BOOYAH! Didn’t see THAT one comin’, didja? Oh, you did? Ok, well I guess I put it in the title, but I digress. My youngest didn’t see it coming, the same kid who has been known to smuggle a peanut butter jar and a spoon into her bedroom, and she thought these were nirvana. So will you.
Peanut Butter Filled Chocolate Cookies
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup butter softened
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup peanut butter
1 egg
1 tablespoon milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
3/4 cup sifted powdered sugar
1/2 cup peanut butter
Preheat oven to 350 degree F. In a medium mixing bowl stir together flour, cocoa powder, and baking soda. In another mixing bowl, beat together butter, the 1/2 cup granulated sugar, brown sugar, and the 1/4 cup peanut butter with an electric mixer until combined. Add the egg, milk, and vanilla; beat well. Beat in as much of the dry ingredients as you can with mixer. Stir in remaining dry ingredients by hand with a wooden spoon. I have a powerful Kitchen-Aid mega mixer which could mix cement so I used the mixer the entire time. Form chocolate dough into 32 balls about 1-1/4 inches in diameter.
For peanut butter filling, in a medium mixing bowl combine powdered sugar and the remaining 1/2 cup peanut butter until smooth. Shape mixture into 32 (3/4-inch) balls. On a work surface, slightly flatten a chocolate dough ball and top with a peanut butter ball. Shape the chocolate dough over the peanut butter filling, completely covering the filling. Roll dough into a ball. Repeat with the remaining chocolate dough and peanut butter filling balls.
Place balls 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake ‘em in for 8-10 minutes or until they’re just set and surface is slightly cracked. Let cookies stand for 1 minute. Transfer cookies to wire racks; cool. They will be slightly soft so don’t overbake ‘em unless you want to play ice hockey out front with them.
You can pretty these up with a little drizzle of chocolate, but I had to get my flour covered butt out of the kitchen. They’re just as good without.
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December 11th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
You’ve got to be kidding me. There goes my afternoon.
Thanks, Francie!
December 11th, 2008 at 1:41 pm
Love these! Did you see my post on something very similar?
http://therecipegirl.blogspot.com/2008/12/magic-in-the-middles.html
December 11th, 2008 at 1:59 pm
Well…I thought I had my Christmas cookie list complete. I guess I was wrong. I can’t wait to try these. They sound and look amazing!
December 11th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
These look great. Much better than my cookie fiasco. I have a cookie swap tonight so I tried to make these caramel filled pecan cookies, sounded good but they turned out all flat and fell apart. I am admittedly not much of a baker. Luckily I had a second (and easier) recipe to bake and they turned out better:)
December 11th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
oh…….my…
December 11th, 2008 at 4:56 pm
An 11-hour baking session? WOW! We should have a bake-a-thon :-p And yes, there is magic
December 12th, 2008 at 7:57 am
These sound so delicious and are two of my favorites combination’s.
December 12th, 2008 at 11:19 pm
I might have missed where it mentions this.. but what do you do with the last 2 tablespoons of sugar? Its at the bottom of the ingredient list but I’m missing where it says in the directions what to do with it.
I’m trying these today
December 12th, 2008 at 11:58 pm
also, are these supposed to be 1 1/2 cups?
December 13th, 2008 at 8:32 am
@Kesh – Oops! If you want, you can use the sugar to dip your cup in and press the cookies flat before baking. I chose not to but didn’t explain that.
December 13th, 2008 at 3:50 pm
What a great little surprise in the middle of a cookie! I love chocolate and peanut butter together. This looks like a great recipe!
December 13th, 2008 at 8:39 pm
Those look absolutely amazing!
December 14th, 2008 at 5:20 pm
these look amazing.
my boyfriend and i tried them last night, and maybe we did something wrong…
the recipe doesn’t say how much butter, unless my blond is showing through and i missed it, and our chocolate dough could in no way be molded into a ball. it was just a runny bowl of yummy chocolate.
when we baked them, there was a big ball of peanut butter surrounded by a chocolate cookie. The only problem was the peanut butter stayed in the ball.
please help!
thanks
December 14th, 2008 at 5:42 pm
nevermind!
i retract my above comment…
im such a blonde!!
December 14th, 2008 at 7:50 pm
All I can say is wow, Francie. I found this recipe late last night and HAD to try them. I just now finished making a double batch, and already 2 dozen have gone missing (I guess that sharing a house with 2 roommates and my girlfriend will do that =P). Anyway, if you don’t mind I’d like to share a few extra pointers, based on my experience with these awesome cookies:
Sadly, I have a small kitchen that heats up very quickly when the oven is on, and this led to two major problems:
1. The dough began to sweat after about 10 minutes of being left out, and
2. The peanut butter balls just wouldn’t hold together.
The solution to both problems is obviously to keep everything cold, especially between batches.
Storing the dough balls in the fridge is more than enough to help them better stay together. A few seconds in a closed hand thaws the dough out well enough to roll.
I found that the peanut butter balls were quite literally melting after no more than 5 minutes of being left on the counter. To counteract this, I stirred in 2 tablespoons of graham cracker crumbs (a trick I learned when making knockoff Reese’s cups), and stored them in the freezer between batches. I’ll also consider making about half as much more filling next time.
Great cookies, Francie! Now I’ve gotta get back downstairs, I’m sure another dozen of your cookies are gone by now =P
December 15th, 2008 at 8:38 am
@Jono – Thanks for the feedback. I think the graham cracker crumbs tip was great. And I think refrigerating the dough is a good idea since these are molded cookies.
December 16th, 2008 at 6:53 pm
great cookies! YUMMY.thanks for the recipe!
December 16th, 2008 at 8:57 pm
Lol, mine are in the oven! No, really. super easy to make, I just hope I made them right!!!! The dough was soooo, soooo, soooo, good!
December 16th, 2008 at 9:16 pm
OH MY LORD THESE ARE THE BEST COOKIES I HAVE EVER EVER EVER EVER EVER TASTED. It’s a good thing my caps was broke, cuz it showed how DANG good this… food of the gods is. I devoured in so slowly, I felt like i had reached Nirvana, or something
any ways, 11/10.
December 17th, 2008 at 1:23 am
O.K. Now you’ve done it. I stumbled upon this post and almost shorted my laptop with drooooooooooooool…
I will be making these over the winter festival holiday!
This will be the first bake with our own chickens’ eggs. Whoohoo!
December 17th, 2008 at 2:34 pm
I made these over the weekend with my boyfriend’s help and they are just lovely. I even added some to the gift tins I made for my coworkers this week… but we kept most of them for ourselves!
So far, you have never steered me wrong. Thanks!
December 17th, 2008 at 5:42 pm
Since my husband is a big fan of peanut butter cups, these cookies would really appeal to him!
December 17th, 2008 at 6:10 pm
looks yummy!!I can’t wait to try them!
December 18th, 2008 at 5:08 pm
I stumble upon your receipt today. I was going to cook some chocolate brownies for a supper with friends but i just remember that one of my friends don’t really like chocolate. He LOVE peanut butter though. So I made those instead. My batch did 16 big cookies, so after just one we’ve reach our limit of sugar but they’re sure good! Yummy! Thanks!
December 20th, 2008 at 8:46 pm
These are heavenly, and very easy. We made one batch, and after we tasted the first ones we decided we had to make another DOUBLE batch. I highly recommend these cookies.
December 21st, 2008 at 4:13 pm
I made these, they are to die for!!!
December 22nd, 2008 at 4:24 am
Oh my, those look so yummy I have to leave before I start to drool
December 22nd, 2008 at 9:28 am
Yuuummmyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
December 23rd, 2008 at 12:19 am
Just finished making them with my 11 year old daughter. We had a ball. She did almost everything herself. Daddy only really had to deal with the electric hand mixer.
We had a couple of problems, but nothing major. We made the balls too small (wound up making 43 cookies, but one dropped on the floor, so 42), and the peanut butter was the organic kind that separates. That made the peanut butter a little dry. So we added about a teaspoon of canola oil and that worked out well.
The smell was great. But after a while a little overwhelming. By the time the cookies were ready I was soooo not in the mood to eat anything. Then, my 8 year old son walks in and is ready for them. He went gaga, then we all digged in.(Yes, he was our guinea pig.) Daddy managed to eat 3 after all. Milk was a must-have.
I’m so proud of my daughter making the cookies, and helping me clean up.
Thanks Francine.
December 23rd, 2008 at 3:29 pm
OMG THESE ARE AMAZING!!!! Such unassuming little morsels until you take that first bite and BAM !!! there’s that incredible little surprise in the center!!! Even my daughter, who doesn’t really like peanut butter all that well, was drooling for the next one!!
December 24th, 2008 at 7:42 am
HI!! i’ve made these cookies for the past 4 years for my families cookie exchange on christmas eve. I’ve also made them for coworkers at almost every job i’ve had since finding this recipe in a cookie magazine so long ago! I have to say, they are by FAR the best cookies, always get a fantastic response!! this year, my husband and I made 24 dozen of them!!! always a hit and they are sure to not go bad (since they don’t last long enough!!!).
Just to add one thing: To store these cookies, they last about 3 days in an airtight container (after, just throw ‘em in the microwave for about 2-3 seconds and they’re like new again!) or freeze them up to 3 months (airtight of course!)
Enjoy!! and thanks for posting! i always refer people to this post who want the recipe!
December 24th, 2008 at 7:54 pm
I just made these today for the holidays. They are sooo delicious!
December 25th, 2008 at 11:42 am
This is the best recipe ever. Wow have I got a treat for everyone today.
December 26th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
I decided to make this for our holiday get together. I think I messed up somewhere because they ended up looking more like brownie bites than cookies. Still I turned my head around for 5 minutes and they were all gone. Thanks for the recipe.
December 26th, 2008 at 9:33 pm
I like this recipe, will try it
December 31st, 2008 at 8:55 am
Working new years’ and have just made these to have with my co-workers tonight. genius!
January 2nd, 2009 at 12:37 am
oh my – those look sinful – can’t wait to make em
January 2nd, 2009 at 8:35 am
I just wanted to tell you that I made these over Christmas and they were absolutely yummy! Thank you so much for the recipe. I’ve “stolen” several of your recipes and they have all been wonderful. As a plus, your writing is truly delightful. Best wishes for many more blog-filled years.
January 6th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
I made these a couple weeks ago, i took some to school and they were gone within seconds. I’m back again to get the recipe for the batch im making in about 20 minutes… I recommend working in a cool kitchen though … that is what i did and they came out great…Store at room temperature in plastic containers.
January 10th, 2009 at 1:06 pm
These are great. I stumbled on to your site. I’ll be back often.
January 14th, 2009 at 1:55 pm
I just have to try these, the grandkids would love them!
January 28th, 2009 at 4:15 pm
I made some of these (baked 8, froze the rest of the dough) for my fiance tonight and he loved them! I did reduce the powdered sugar in the PB filling to 1/2 cup and it was still plenty sweet.
February 3rd, 2009 at 1:54 pm
You have such great recipes! We’d love it if you’d join our recipe card swap!
http://www.swap-bot.com/swap/show/30141
Check it out! Share your recipes and get some new ones to try!
March 16th, 2009 at 3:49 am
“Booyah” is such a stupid phrase. Did you pick that up from Cramer?
April 5th, 2009 at 8:47 am
This is the way things should be, get off what we are on now
April 14th, 2009 at 9:06 pm
I am not happy with vanilla extract. If you substitute something like Juliet Mae, Vanilla Sugar; it has naturally flavored sugar and a whole vanilla bean to get a scrape. Anyway. as a substitute to the alcohol based extract it is most excellent. I am going to try the sugar in this recipe cause these cookies look really worthy. I’ll blog the results…
June 21st, 2009 at 7:07 am
These are delicious, made a batch this morning – the kids love the peanutty surprise in the middle!
August 6th, 2009 at 11:02 am
I made these cookies all the time at a group home that i used to work at. Everyone loved them. Along the way i lost the recipe. Finally glad to have these back in my life, my kids love them just as much as i do. thank you thank you thank you.
August 24th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
These look amazing and so moist.. I have to try them for a peanut butter lover friend of mine. I intend to add them into a gift basket with peanut butter popcorn and other treats. It’s the middle of summer and I have no AC, but I must fight the odds and make these glorious cookies! I’ll keep the dough in the fridge as much as possible… looks like I’ll need a double batch just not to eat them all!
September 23rd, 2009 at 10:43 am
Is it okay to make these with natural peanut butter? Has anyone tried? It looks like maybe that’s what Scott used (organic means probably natural as well). They look AMAZING and I plan on making them for a dinner party this weekend.
November 15th, 2009 at 1:54 am
These were fantastic! I added a little ginger, cinnamon, and about 1 tablespoon of molasses, which really intensified the chocolate flavor. I will be using Thanksgiving as an excuse to make them again.
Heather, I used natural peanut butter successfully, it will just create a much drier pb mixture (because of the lack of shortening I think), but not dry enough to ruin the flavor.
My pb mixture was dry and crumbly, but just moist enough to hold together in very solid balls if you compress tightly. From the reviews I assumed I’d need to chill them to work with them as many said their mixtures would not form balls, so I chilled them until I was ready to assemble, but this proved unnecessary with natural peanut butter. The cookies stayed in balls when they baked because of this, but after my first batch I pre-flattened them before going in the oven, and they came out great.
November 15th, 2009 at 2:02 am
I was also able to easily make these vegan and pretty much cholesterol free by using Ener-G egg replacer powder.. I’ll try applesauce (1/4 cup) next go around. I’ll also try half natural and half conventional peanut butter. This was an amazing find!! Thanks so much!