Peanut Butter Crunch Cookies

I'm so excited for this post!  Today is my first post for the Secret Recipe Club (SRC)!  If you haven't heard about it, you can learn everything you need to know here, but basically each Monday a group of bloggers post a recipe they've made from another blogger's repertoire, but nobody knows who's featuring their blog until that morning, hence a secret club!  It's a fabulous opportunity to check out new bloggers and force yourself to try new things.  I hope you'll take a look at some of the other bloggers in my group by checking out the blog hop at the bottom of this post.

I had the privilege of baking from Andi's blog, The Wednesday Baker.  Andi felt like a kindred spirit as I read her blog subtitle "One cookie at a time..." With a heading like that, I knew immediately that I'd be baking one of Andi's cookie recipes--to the point that I didn't allow myself to look at any of the other yummy things on her blog until I committed to a cookie recipe.  And by committed, I mean choose three and made Dave pick one, thus ensuring that I had to make them since he'd expect them.  Be sure to check out Andi's blog and take a spin through her sweet treats and good eats.  I already have a few other recipes from Andi that I plan to try and post.



These cookies are a fun twist on peanut butter and jelly.  The crispies add a nontraditional texture to the cookies, and really, besides chocolate is there anything better paired with peanut butter than jelly?  I used strawberry, but any flavor will do.  I'll admit, after living off of PB&Js for lunch for nearly 4 months while working an internship in a major metropolitan area for $75 a week to cover my meals and non-housing expenses, I vowed to never eat the sandwich again.  But I never said anything about a cookie!  I made mine smaller than Andi (she prefers them bigger, but I like to have a lot of little ones) and I ended up forgoing the traditional criss-cross pattern on the peanut butter cookie when I realized my jelly might not stay put.  But otherwise the recipe was easy to pull together and made for a unique and yummy treat.

Peanut Butter Crunch Cookies

Ingredients

1/2 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1 egg
3/4 cup peanut butter
1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups crispy rice cereal
1/2 cup peanuts, chopped
1/2 cup jelly or jam, your choice of flavor

Using a large mixing bowl or a stand mixer fitted with a beater attachment, beat butter and sugars until fluffy, scraping sides of bowl as needed.  Add egg, peanut butter and vanilla and continue beating until combined.

In a medium bowl, sift together flour, baking soda and salt.  Switch to a paddle attachment and add flour mixture to butter mixture, mixing until incorporated.

Add cereal and peanuts and mix in by hand.  You basically want to mix enough to make all the cereal stick into the dough.

Using a small cookies scoop, place balls of dough about 2 inches apart on parchment or Silpat lined baking sheets.  Using your thumb or finger, make a small indentation in the center of each cookie. If you make a larger cookie, you can use a fork to create the traditional criss-cross pattern on the cookie before making your indentation.

Place about 1/2 to 1 teaspoon of jelly or jam into the indentation.

Bake at 375 degrees F for 8-9 minutes (smaller cookies) or 10-12 minutes (larger cookies).  Turn baking sheet 180 degrees halfway through. If using more than one sheet at a time, rotate positions in the oven for more even baking.

Allow cookies to cool on pans for a few minutes before transferring to wire racks to cool completely.


Makes 4 1/2 dozen.


Happy Baking, and be sure to check our Andi at The Wednesday Baker and all the other SRC bloggers via the blog hop below!
The Cookie Princess


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