Peanut Butter Blossoms

My family has this strange and serious addiction to peanut butter.  You may be able to relate.  We wake up in the middle of the night to eat it right out of the jar (Hi, Mom).  We stir it into ice cream.  We add it to S’mores.  We all agree on the fact that we could happily eat a car bumper if it were covered in peanut butter.  You get the picture. 

This is one of the many peanut butter-centric recipes I grew up enjoying.  You can see why these are a favorite.  Peanut Butter Blossoms are a divine combination of peanut butter cookies and chocolate kisses.  Could it get any better?  How about the fact that this recipe only has 5 ingredients?  Yes, it’s true.  These delicious little devils have been done a million times over and this recipe is my favorite for a few reasons.  First, they are so incredibly easy.  This is the recipe to make when you have that I-want-fresh-homemade-cookies-and-I-want-them-now craving.  (I guess you could make them for other people, too.) Second, because we’re leaving out the flour in this recipe these little gems are fudgier than their floury counterparts.  Finally, listen up peanut butter fans:  peanut butter makes up almost 30% of the ingredients in the bowl here.  Thirty percent! That means if each cookie can be eaten in an average of 3 bites, almost one whole bite is just peanut butter.   

You can thank me later.

 Grab a bowl and scoop out some of your favorite creamy peanut butter.

Marvel at its greatness!

Throw in your egg, vanilla, and sugar and start stirring.

Keep stirring.

The dough should look like this:

Now roll these into little balls – about the size of a tablespoon.  

 I like pretty equal cookie to chocolate kiss ratio and this size seems to be perfect.  

Time for the sugar shower

Line these up on a cookie sheet and you’re ready to bake – they should take around 13 minutes.  

While these are in the oven, start unwrapping those adorable little kisses. 

One for the cookies, one for me...

All of the sudden, you’ll notice your entire house smells like roasted peanuts.  Pretty sure this beats a kitchen timer any day...  You’ll know when they're done because they will start to crack and will become pale.

  Time to crown each one with a chocolate kiss.

Must. Try. One. Now.

Amazing.

These are so good.  Let’s just say there were a lot more (more than I care to admit) on this plate before I finished taking pictures.  The sugar on the outside of these cookies creates this little crunch effect; meanwhile the inside is peanut butter fudge heaven.  Not to mention the creamy chocolate.  Need I say more?

Peanut Butter Blossoms

1 cup creamy peanut butter

1 cup granulated sugar

1 large egg

1 tsp. vanilla

Hershey Kisses

Extra sugar for coating

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.  Mix the peanut butter, egg, sugar, and vanilla until completely incorporated.  Roll into balls – about 1 tablespoon each.  Roll the balls around in the extra sugar to coat them.  Place about an inch apart on a cookie sheet and bake for about 13 minutes (times will vary depending on your oven) As soon as they come out of the oven gently press a Hershey kiss into the top of each cookie.  Allow the cookies to cool for 2 minutes on the cookie sheet before moving to a cooling rack.  Keep in mind it will take additional time for the chocolate to set so if you need to package these up sooner rather than later, park these in the fridge to cool and re-harden the chocolate.  You can easily double or triple this recipe as needed.