These are soft-baked and super thick peanut butter cookies topped with Reese’s peanut butter cups. They’re exactly like peanut butter blossoms but with a peanut butter cup!
Using my absolute favorite peanut butter cookies recipe as the base, go ahead and stick a peanut butter cup inside after baking. You won’t regret it. 🙂
Today’s peanut butter cup cookies are complete with sparkly sugar. And like these peanut butter blossoms, they’re guaranteed to be the thickest peanut butter cookies you ever taste!
Have you ever tried my recipe for super soft peanut butter cookies? It’s lived on my website for years and I have many cookie recipes using the same dough:
- Peanut Butter M&M Cookies
- Peanut Butter Valentine’s Day Cookies
- Peanut Butter Blossoms
- PB&J Thumbprints
- Reese’s Stuffed Peanut Butter Cookies
Today’s peanut butter cup cookies are my personal take on traditional peanut butter blossoms, which are typically made with chocolate kiss candies. I simply used peanut butter cups instead. Whenever there’s an opportunity for more peanut butter, just say yes.
How to Make Peanut Butter Cup Cookies
They’re snap to make! Simply mix up the peanut butter cookie dough, chill for about 1 hour, then roll into balls.
- Baking tip: Roll the cookie dough balls in a little granulated sugar. This gives the finished peanut butter cup cookies a little sparkle.
Bake the cookies for only about 10 minutes.
- Baking tip: The trick to their softness is slightly underbaking, so make sure you don’t keep them in the oven for too long. The cookies will be very puffy and soft-looking, but they’ll set as they cool.
Cool the cookies for about 5 minutes, then press a peanut butter cup on top.
- Baking tip: Quickly transfer the cookies to a plate and freeze for about 10 minutes or until the peanut butter cup has set. Some peanut butter cups will melt into the cookies, but that’s completely fine.
You will LOVE how thick these peanut butter cup cookies are! If you have any cookies left by day 4 or 5, you’ll be pleasantly surprised that they remain just as soft. In fact, these cookies get softer as the days go by! They completely defy cookie science. And I love it.
If you…
- Have a peanut butter lover in your life, you have to make these cookies.
- Love peanut butter as much as I do, you have to make these cookies.
- Have any taste buds at all, you have to make these cookies. Case closed.
Peanut Butter Cup Cookies
- Prep Time: 1 hour, 30 minutes (includes chilling)
- Cook Time: 12 minutes
- Total Time: 1 hour, 45 minutes
- Yield: 24 cookies
- Category: Cookies
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
Soft-baked and super thick peanut butter cookies topped with Reese’s peanut butter cups. They’re exactly like peanut butter blossoms but with a peanut butter cup! This cookie dough requires 1 hour of chilling in the refrigerator.
Ingredients
- 1 and 1/4 cups (156g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup (113g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 1/2 cup (100g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 1/4 cup (50g) granulated sugar
- 3/4 cup (185g) creamy peanut butter*
- 1 large egg, at room temperature*
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Topping
- 1/2 cup (100g) granulated sugar (for rolling, optional)
- 24 Reese’s Miniature Peanut Butter Cups, unwrapped
Instructions
- Whisk the flour, baking soda, and salt together in a medium bowl. Set aside.
- In a large bowl using a hand-held mixer or stand mixer with paddle attachment, cream the butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar together on medium speed until combined. On low speed, beat in the peanut butter, egg, and vanilla extract. Turn the mixer up to high and beat until light in color and smooth, about 1-2 minutes. Scrape down the sides and up the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula as needed. On low speed, slowly pour in the dry ingredients. Mix until combined.
- Cover tightly and chill the cookie dough for at least 1 hour and up to 3 days.
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (177°C). Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats. (Always recommended for cookies.) Set aside.
- Remove cookie dough from the refrigerator. Measure cookies to be 1.5 Tablespoons each. I recommend this medium cookie scoop. Pour extra 1/2 cup granulated sugar for the topping in a bowl. Roll each cookie dough ball in the granulated sugar and arrange 3 inches apart on the baking sheets.
- Bake for 11-13 minutes. Cookies will look very soft. Remove from the oven and allow cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes. Working quickly, press 1 peanut butter cup into the center of each cookie. Quickly transfer the cookies to a freezer-safe dish (I use a plate) and freeze for 10-15 minutes or until the peanut butter cup has set. Some of the peanut butter cups will melt slightly – that’s ok.
Notes
- Make Ahead Instructions: Cookies stay fresh covered at room temperature for up to 1 week. You can make the cookie dough and chill it in the refrigerator for up to 4 days. Allow to sit at room temperature for 30 minutes, then continue with step 4. Baked cookies with peanut butter cup on top freeze well for up to 3 months. Unbaked cookie dough balls freeze well for up to 3 months. Bake frozen cookie dough balls for an extra minute, no need to thaw. Read my tips and tricks on how to freeze cookie dough.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Glass Mixing Bowl | Whisk | Electric Mixer (Handheld or Stand) | Baking Sheets | Silicone Baking Mats or Parchment Paper | Medium Cookie Scoop
- Why Room Temperature Ingredients? Room temperature egg is best for cookies. General rule of thumb: when using warm or room temperature butter, I recommend room temperature egg as well. To bring egg to room temperature quickly, simply place in a cup of warm water for 5 minutes.
- Peanut Butter: Thick, non-natural creamy peanut butter is best but if using natural style, make sure the peanut butter is thick and not oily in the slightest.
- Double Batches: This recipe can easily be doubled or tripled by doubling or tripling each ingredient. Chill for at least 90 minutes if doubling or tripling.
- Be sure to check out my top 5 cookie baking tips AND these are my 10 must-have cookie baking tools.
Keywords: peanut butter cup cookies
Oh dear I just made 3 of these and they spread like crazy in the oven. I followed all instructions but even after 90 mins in fridge dough was still super soft to touch. Made a double batch!!! How do I rescue the remainder of the dough in the fridge?
Hi Alexis, there are quite a few factors that can go into cookies over spreading — this post on how to prevent cookies from spreading will be a helpful place to start. You can try chilling the dough for even longer with the current dough. Hope this helps!
These are fantastic! I first made them a couple years ago as one of a couple different types of Christmas cookies; now, my husband only wants these! I make them according to the recipe and it has worked out perfectly every time.
Curious if peanut butter powder could be subbed for the peanut butter somehow? I got a huge tub of powdered recently and thought this might be a good way to use some of it 🙂
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Made these for Christmas this year. I did not see the note at the bottom of recipe to chill for at least 90 minutes if double or tripling the recipe, so only chilled for 1 hour. Also, I think my oven may run hot as the 11 minutes seemed to overbake. Mine came out a little less chewy than I was hoping, I may have baked a minute too long? Also, the reese’s cups don’t go in very far to the cookie. Next time I will probably do the Hershey’s Kiss instead of the peanut butter cup as they look prettier. Overall a pretty good cookie. 🙂
★★★★
These cookies are delicious and always fly off the plate when I bring them anywhere!
My one question is, my cookies are always much flatter than the ones in the picture, the Reese’s cup can only be covered about halfway. I’m following the recipe exactly – and ideas how to make my cookies thicker?
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Hi Tracy! Here’s our best tips for preventing cookies from spreading. So glad you love these!
I did a variation of this once by adding Reese’s pieces into the dough, which was amazing considering I’m not even a big peanut butter guy.
Tonight I went really crazy and stuffed a Girl Scout Tagalog cookie into the middle. I also make fewer cookies, but they’re really big (scary calorie count)! Can’t wait to try it!
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I chatted with a coworker today about these cookies which she made over the weekend. They are amazing by the way! I made your other recipe which was the Soft & Thick Peanut Butter Cookies. Her cookies from this recipe spread a fair bit more during baking. I suspected I just chilled my dough longer. But I am comparing the two now . I see that this dough has 1 1/4 cup flour but the plain peanut butter cookies have 1 1/3 cup flour. I’m wondering if that is intentional or possibly an error in this recipe. Either way, both cookies are delicious. These were just a little flat to press a peanut butter cup into.
Hi Debbie! The recipe for soft and thick peanut butter cookies has an extra Tablespoon of flour to retain shape because we’re flattening with a fork. Your co-worker’s cookies may have spread more because her butter was softer, the dough was not as cold, or simply because hers flattened more with the addition of the peanut butter cup / your plain cookies were not pressed down as much. Hope this is helpful, and thank you both for giving these recipes a try!
This is my second or third time reviewing these, because they are that perfect. My loved ones look most forward to these of all the treats I make. They’re THE best. Your recipes are all next level, every time. Thank you for making all holidays sweeter!
★★★★★
Oh Sally, I’m coming to you having forgotten to pick up creamy peanut butter at the store.
How terrible would it be to substitute crunch peanut butter instead? Would that mess up anything else?
Thank you so much!
Hi Natalie, Crunchy peanut butter makes them taste a bit dry. We recommend waiting until you have creamy for these cookies!
I’ve been making these cookies for years using either PB cup or Hershey’s Kiss. My problem is that when I take them to a party, candy starts dropping out of some of them. I’ve even tried putting them back in oven for 2-3” after pushing them into the baked cookies, but it still happens. Does anyone else have this problem? I notice in picture that you’ve pushed them way down into cookie, but doesn’t that make cookie “crack” too much?
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You can put the crunchy peanut butter in your food processor…that should give you creamy peanut butter.
These are the best peanut butter cookies I have EVER had!!
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These cookies are amazing! I make them all the time and my kids love helping!
I found that if you leave the cookies in the freezer for 30 minutes you are less likely to have too much melting and the Reese’s keep their shape better. Cookies still taste fantastic 🙂
Thanks for sharing Sally!
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I made these over the weekend with a bunch of your other recipe’s for my sons 4th bday party. HUGE HIT!! They were the biggest hit of the party. Thank you so much!!
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Love this recipe! The cookies really do stay very thick. I played around with it a little and replaced a few tablespoons of flour with cocoa powder instead to make it more chocolatey. They were delicious! I found that if you freeze the peanut butter cups before pressing them into the cookies, they don’t melt half as much afterward. Thanks for another great recipe, Sally!
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Hello! Should these be stored at room temperature or in the fridge? Thank you! SO good
Hi Nick, these can be stored at room temperature. They’ll stay for up to 1 week (if that last that long!).
These are delicious and so easy to make! I had some red and green sugar on hand, so I went ahead and rolled some of the balls in colored sugar for fun. Turned out great!
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I have been making these cookies for years, but in mini muffin cups. For some reason, the chocolate on the PB cup turns a milky white the next day. Any suggestions??
Marie M.
I’ve made this recipe before and they were delicious. I didn’t have baking soda so I replaced with baking power. Big mistake on my end.
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Just made a batch of these cookies for my family and THEY LOVE THEM! Thank you for sharing this recipe Sally 🙂
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Hi Sally! These look incredible! So, I had a question. So, I’ve seen these adorable little spider cookies with an upside down Reese’s miniature with eyeballs on it and icing coming off the sides of the cookie to look like legs (this wasn’t a great description, but if you google spider cookies you’ll see what I’m talking about) I was wondering if that would work for these. Do the cups get super melty and unshapely, or do they maintain their shape for the most part? Like, do you think I could do that with these? Thank you SO MUCH!
Hi Kaylee! Yes, I totally know which cookies you’re talking about. The peanut butter cups get a little melty in these cookies, but if you let the cookies cool for a few extra minutes before adding the peanut butter cup, they’ll be ok. You can definitely do that spider decoration with these.
Thank you so much, Sally! You’re awesome!