Saturday, April 11, 2009

Peanut Butter Easter Eggs

When I was a little girl, my grandparents would bring each of my siblings a giant See's Easter egg with our name drawn out in beautiful loops of royal icing. This along with the dry roasted peanuts and M and Ms would be the sum total of our Easter candy. It lasted approximately two hours and then it would be weeks before we had candy again. Times have changed. My own charges get so much candy all of the time-sackfulls at birthday parties, rewards after ballet lessons, even lollipops after a visit to the doctor. We have an entire shelf full of Halloween candy, Christmas candy, and Valentine's candy that no one is particularly interested in eating. Instead of buying more candy that would inevitably end up un-eaten, we decided to make our own candy this year. Homemade candy is special, even in this age of plentiful sweets.(Although I confess that I did buy the M and Ms and plain roasted peanuts for nostalgic reasons.) The favorite candy around here, and one that we never have on hand for long, is Peanut Butter Cups. They are so easy, delicious, and inexpensive to make, plus they look adorable shaped as Easter Eggs. You still have time to make some. Whatever candy is in your baskets tomorrow, may your holiday be endearingly sweet. Happy Easter!
Money Saving Tips:
Look for quality chocolate at a good price for dipping. If you are lucky enough to have a Trader Joe's, then buy some of the Belgian milk chocolate. I used melted Hershey bar's since I still have a cupboard full. This makes a big batch, so you'll have plenty to share.
Form the dough into egg shapes and freeze. You can also make fudge centers, if you like.Dip in chocolate. You can use milk, dark, or white chocolate. I like to use all three. Chill to set. Decorate as desired.
Peanut Butter Easter Eggs
Estimated Cost: about $7.00 for 30
1/2 cup softened butter
1 cup peanut butter
about 1 and 1/2 cups powdered sugar
generous pinch of salt
1-2 cups crisp rice cereal
about 12 ounces milk chocolate
In a medium bowl, combine butter, peanut butter, powdered sugar and salt. Add more powdered sugar if needed to form a very soft dough, like the texture of playdough. If desired add rice cereal for crunch. Form into egg shapes and freeze for at least two hours. Melt chocolate in a medium bowl. I melt mine very slowly in the microwave. Dip eggs in chocolate to coat. Place on waxed paper and chill until set. Decorate with melted candy melts if desired.
Next Up
Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Icing

25 comments:

JJ said...

1. Stop it, I am dying at how amazing these look!

2. The See's Candy Easter Egg, yum, yum! Must be a SoCal thing, we always got one as well...confession, I still do! My Mom still sends me Sees's for Easter!

Christina said...

Aww, we used to have those huge eggs with our names drawn on them, too! :)

gigi said...

Now you know how I LOVE PEANUT BUTTER!!!! How awesome are these!
You rock!
Easter Blessings!

LizNoVeggieGirl said...

Hooray for more memories and HOLY YUM Easter treats!! Hope that your holiday is fabulous :-)

Marjie said...

Those are beautiful! Happy Easter!

Katie and Mark said...

I made these with my family tonight! I will have to let you know how ours turned out....

Anonymous said...

You sure brought back some fun and fantastic memories. Your Easter looks it will be such a hit (I get forgetting tomorrow is your Easter, ours is Today)... utterly confusing... hehe

Lori Decoite said...

these looked so amazing so I had to try them-they were DELISH!! I blogged about your amazing recipe : )http://thedecoitefamily.blogspot.com/2009/04/do-you-like-peanut-butter.html

Jaime and Jen DISH said...

YUM!!! And I love the music! Awwww, the good ole days and I'm only 37...my grandparents taught me well. I LOVE this blog!

Sara said...

Wow!!! These look amazing! I will definitely give them a try...next year, seeing that I am loaded with Reese's eggs right now. Thanks!

Jamie said...

Too cute they look delicious!

vanillasugarblog said...

Oh I love the cheap chocolate at TJ. I was amazed at how much I could get for so little--I think it was a whole pound of chocolate. I made some coconut eggs with the dark chocolate and it was so good.

Catherine said...

I'm so glad that I got to spend Easter with you and eat these delicious peanut butter eggs! They were so tasty as was everything else you made. I can't think of anything more delicious than holidays with Prudy!

Emily said...

Awesome! These look crazy-delicious.

Coleens Recipes said...

I love hand made candy...not only because it tastes better, but because it shows you care.

Melanie Anne said...

mmm these look so great! I am impressed! Hope your easter was happy!

Kerstin said...

They look so good - peanut butter stuffed eggs are my favorite :) I hope you had a lovely celebration!

Aggie said...

Oh how I would have loved to have found one of these Easter morning!!

whitneyingram said...

Sometimes food causes my to mumble profanities.

Damn, damn, damn. I firmly believe that peanut butter and chocolate are a celestial marriage.

Michal said...

i have been bemoaning the fact that i didn't buy enough peanut butter eggs. i might just make these even though we are days past easter.

Leslie said...

These are just the cutest things ever!

Adrienne said...

Those are beautiful Prudy! I have also seen recipes with crushed graham crackers added to the peanut butter dough for texture. I like the rice krispie idea too :)

Jerri at Simply Sweet Home said...

These look so yummy!

Carly said...

These look fabulous! I have actually been thinking about a homemade take on reeses and these look amazing! Can't wait to try them out!

Anne Marie said...

I made those too! but with a different recipe-
weren't they yumo!