Perfect Peanut Butter Blossoms.
When it comes to peanut butter blossoms, I always use the recipe on the back of the Hershey Kiss bag. Always.
And I really had no intentions of sharing said recipe with you, because while it is my favorite cookie of all time, it’s so well known that I figured most of you had the recipe. And if you didn’t, it’s only a drive to the grocery store away.
So, this may not be as exciting as cake batter bark, but I’m going to let you in on a little secret.
I posted my holiday baking list and had over one hundred requests for “my” peanut butter blossom recipe. Really?!
So there you have it – my recipe comes from the back of the bag!
But do you know who’s didn’t? Mother Lovett’s. I don’t know if I mentioned it before, but I would help Mother Lovett bake Christmas cookies every year. Not because she wanted my help. But because she was blind and deaf and unless we wanted charred rocks on Christmas Eve, someone needed to be there to hear the oven timer go off.
Peanut Butter Blossoms were especially tricky, because you had to hear the timer go off the first time to push the kisses in, then the second time to remove the cookies to cool.
This never went well for Mother Lovett, who often ended up with crisp, burnt peanut butter slabs with puddles of chocolate in the middle.
Every year, even though we had a bag of Kisses ready to go, she’d search high and low for that recipe. Â We couldn’t possibly just use the one of the bag, the one right in front of us. Just like some of her others, it is typewriter-typed on a yellowed index card, with a note on the back, “I got 49 cookies in 1999.” That is often how she kept track of how many cookies each batch yielded.
Don’t you just want to dive into that batter?
So here’s the deal. Most peanut butter blossom recipes call for shortening. I do have shortening, but I know that many of you don’t. And why buy it for one recipe? Â I knew that somewhere along the way I had made these with butter before, so I tried them out with butter and it worked perfectly.
Mother Lovett kept most of her cookies stored in the garage, in tattered, worn Horne’s or Kaufmann’s boxes with reused foil and saran wrap. It may sound disturbing, but she kept everything fairly clean – it was that whole depression era thing. Sometimes I wish I caught that gene as I can be so wasteful.
Every December, after the cookies were baked and stored in the garage, it was a race to see which grandchild got into the boxes first. I remember entering her house through the garage and suspiciously opening the peanut butter blossom box, careful not to disturb her perfect wrapping, grabbing a handful of cookies, lowering the box lid and darting up the stairs. Many times the peanut butter blossoms didn’t even make it to Christmas Eve.
Make sure you leave some out for Santa!
Peanut Butter Blossoms
Peanut Butter Blossoms
Ingredients
- 2 sticks butter, softened
- 1 1/2 cups creamy peanut butter
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 cup packed brown sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 3 1/2 cups flour
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 tablespoons milk
- 1/2 cup sugar, for rolling
- 2 bags Hershey Kisses, you only need ~48, unwrapped
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
- Cream butter and peanut butter together until smooth. Add sugars and cream for 2-3 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until combined. Stir in vanilla. Add flour, baking soda and salt, just mixing until combined, then add in milk. Cover and refrigerate dough for 30 minutes or up to 2 days.
- Roll cookies into 1 inch balls and roll in sugar. Lay on baking sheet about 1 inch apart. Bake at 375 for 5 minutes. Remove from oven and push Kiss down into the middle of each cookie. Return to oven and bake for 2 1/2 more minutes. Remove and let cool completely.
Did you make this recipe?
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I appreciate you so much!
Now for the real question. If you could only choose ONE cookie to make this holiday season, which would it be? This would be mine. Hands down.
181 Comments on “Perfect Peanut Butter Blossoms.”
The cookies look delicious and I love the story that goes along with it- very cute.
very cute pb blossoms! they look delicious!
mmmm I would have to say buckeyes. And yes I consider that a cookie :)
I do too!
Peanut butter? Say no more!
One of my favorites! Well done. :)
My must have is my chocolate chip shortbread, it never fails!
Chocolate chip?? That sounds delish!
These are definitely my favorite holiday cookie- but I don’t think I could not make decorated sugar cookies!
I love those ones too!
Nothing wrong with sharing a recipe like that! Afterall, who doesn’t appreciate an easy recipe that we don’t have to go sifting thru our files to find.
Peanut butter and chocolate is a winning combination for me too! Yum!
Those are beautiful.
I love those cookies but I never knew that’s what they were called.
mmm~~these look soooo good!!! i love the pic of them with the christmas lights in the background!!! great shot!!!!! that pic alone makes me want to makes these!!!!!!!!!! good job and your blog is doing great!!!!!
One year in college my roommate and I made a triple batch of these to give out as presents. We ended up eating all of them. ALL OF THEM.
These definitely have my vote for best cookie ever.
wow they look so yummy – must give it a go xxxxx
Ohhhhhh I love peanut butter blossoms so much but I have never made any! You may have just inspired me to change that :)
Hi, Jessica! I found your blog just recently, and I love it for several reasons. First, you have a great spunky writing style that conveys so much personality. Second, your recipes are so creative and delicious-sounding; I am antsy to try them out myself. Third, and most importantly, I LOVE your Mother Lovett anecdotes! Oh, my gosh, what a character. Your stories about her are absolute gems. You are so lucky to have had her in your life, and she was blessed to have a granddaughter like you who will ensure her story lives on. I hope you someday write a book/collection of short stories about her. I’d buy it. :)
I think your grammie and mine were related..b/c mine made these too! They were quite possibly my fave cookie of childhood. Well, wait, no. My grammie’s choc chip cookies were my fave but these ranked way up there. Wow…small grandma recipe kind of world :)
I just found your blog this weekend and I have read through many of your recipes. I’m so glad I found you. :) You inspired me to purchase candy cane kisses, make fettucini alfredo with bacon (your love of bacon inspired me to add it) and oreo balls today. My husband just tried an oreo ball and said it was the “best thing he’s ever eaten”. I’m looking forward to trying many more of your recipes.
Thank you! So glad you found me. :)
I think these are the ultimate Christmas cookie (though I’m not sure how I’ll make it through the holiday season without trying your cake batter bark)! Yours look delicious :)
I make these every year for my buddy Libby. They’re her favorite.
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There are a lot of peanut butter blossoms cookies on sale during Christmas, Chinese New Year and Hari Raya but never with chocolate in the center. These cookies look so delicious! Nice snaps too!
I make these with my older brother when either he comes home to visit or I go out to Colorado to see him. Ah we both call them ‘nipple’ cookies. Even though for other people, I use the PB blossoms wording.
I wonder how other flavors of Kisses would go well with the cookies. I figure that mint wouldn’t taste very well.
Hahah!
I’ve made them with the other kisses, just use a chocolate cookie recipe for the mint/caramel/cherry/coconut/etc Kisses. Or you could also use a sugar cookie for some of those flavors.
My grandmother had that same ‘waste nothing’ gene. I remember her washing and air drying her gallon-size ziploc bags. I won’t lie, I often reuse them too if it’s just cookie crumbs in the bottom. I’m not nearly as frugal as she was though!
Those do look absolutely perfect! And oh so delicious, I will definitely be making these for christmas!
These were actually the first cookies I made for my BF ever! Well not the peanut butter version, just regular chocolate thumbprint with the kiss…but let’s just say…he’s stuck around since so I guess I did something right! LOL Nothing’s wrong with the back of the bag recipes! They’re published for a reason;)
Made your Tortilla soup today..The whole family LOVED IT!! Thank you.
Going to make the granola and I can not wait to try it..
Love your blog found it from Averie.
Happy Holidays.
Hi there! I just found your blog a few days ago and am in love! I just made these cookies and they are amazing! Thanks for sharing!
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Made these today…makes way more than 48! The recipe on the back of the kisses is half your ingredients and they say it makes 48. Not a problem since I have plenty of people who want some!
we made the cookies!!!!
they’re awesome and fun to make, thanks for sharing, you made our saturday night a little more eventful than it would have been :)
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These came out AMAZING! Go figure the package recipe is the best! I did use slightly more pb ;)
I just had a quick question: do you use natural peanut butter (it looks like it is in the first photo). I also LOVE peanut butter blossoms (we used to call them peanut butter thumbprints) and would love to use the natural peanut butter sitting in my fridge in this recipe, but I also know that natural peanut butter doesn’t always sub well for regular processed peanut butter in some recipes, so I thought I would check first.
yum!
Nope, I ALWAYS use regular creamy in my cookies. Well, technically this is Skippy’s Natural, so it says it’s natural but it’s not like the real stuff, you know? I agree – it usually doesn’t sub well for processed pb!
I know the post is a few years old but it would have been helpful to see this tip before the comments section. The picture of the peanut butter at the top and the elimination of shortening is what made this recipe appeal to me. Considering that it still pops on searches you should append the recipe.
Another quick question…. Are these freeze able? I wanna make them for a cookie exchange in two weeks and I think this week may be the only time I have to bake them!
I want to say they are, however, every time I’m froze them, then hershey kiss ends up popping off, or coming off as they come to room temp. I don’t know why!
We’ve always used Nielsons Golden Buds (but I think they might only be available in Canada?), and baked them in right from the beginning; never had a problem with the chocolate bit coming off.
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_okay sOooo I love these cookies and I am planning on making them tonight! I made the m&m cookies last night and they were devoured… I love your page, your writing style is so much like my own I have to laugh each time I read your recipes. I have been sending your link to all my friends because everything you make always looks so fabulous! Keep it up!
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:) :( ;) :P :D <3 me and my mom made some…yummy
These are so good! I used only three cupps of flower and about 4 tablespoons of milk, they are so delicious!!
These were a hit at the Christmas cookie exchange we went to. I made them exactly as written, but I did find that one 12 ounce bag of kisses was more than enough.
I should mention that I made the cookies a little larger than suggested, which may have thrown off the number of Kisses I needed. However, I still had an ample amount of Kisses leftover from my first bag, so I suspect that one full bag would probably be enough even if you rolled the cookies into 1″ balls as suggested.
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I know this recipe was posted quite some time ago, but today (yes, in the middle of summer) I was dying for some peanut butter blossoms and when I bought my bag of kisses- there was no traditional recipe on the back! BOO! It had the recipe for “easy peanut butter blossoms” that uses the bagged peanut butter cookie mix…GROSS!
So thank you very much for posting!
The recipe calls for 1 cup of brown sugar, but the instructions don’t ever use it.
Do you, yourself, test your recipes?
The instructions definitely do use it – it says “add sugars” in the first line. And yes I test all my recipes, some even 3-4 times, but this one has been made for over 30 years so it’s been tested quite a bit more.
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