Winstead Wandering

Prone to Wander

Miniature Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecakes

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What do you get when you combine creamy cheesecake with rich and decadent homemade peanut butter cup bars? You get these Miniature Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecakes.

What do you get when you combine creamy cheesecake with rich and decadent homemade peanut butter cup bars? You get these Miniature Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecakes.

J has two favorite desserts: cheesecake and homemade peanut butter cup bars. Last year for his birthday, I tried to combine those two using a springform pan and a no-bake cheesecake recipe. The resulting dessert was certainly tasty, but it was super messy and it just wasn’t what I had hoped it would be.

This year, I vowed to get things right.

What do you get when you combine creamy cheesecake with rich and decadent homemade peanut butter cup bars? You get these Miniature Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecakes.

I began by making miniature cheesecakes with graham cracker crusts. These little guys, on their own, are delicious. They’d be perfect as is, or topped with fruit. I didn’t stop there, though. I added a layer of chocolate, then a layer of peanut butter, and then another layer of chocolate, to top the cheesecakes with a homemade peanut butter cup.

Y’all, I totally nailed it with this recipe. The cheesecake is creamy and smooth, while the peanut butter cup layer is rich and not too thick. These little threats are perfectly sized for sharing, too!

What do you get when you combine creamy cheesecake with rich and decadent homemade peanut butter cup bars? You get these Miniature Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecakes.

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Chocolate Peanut Butter Cheesecake Protein Dip

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A healthy two ingredient snack that tastes like a sinful dessert? Yup! This Chocolate Peanut Butter Cheesecake Protein Dip is as good for you as it is delicious.

A healthy two ingredient snack that tastes like a sinful dessert? Yup! This Chocolate Peanut Butter Cheesecake Protein Dip is as good for you as it is delicious.

You can file this one under “recipes I should have posted years ago.” I first made this chocolate peanut butter cheesecake protein dip as a snack for my husband. He’s a picky eater, but he loves Greek yogurt, peanut butter, and apples. He’d often eat a serving of yogurt, as well as a sliced apple dipped in powdered peanut butter (mixed with water per serving instructions). One day it hit me that I could mix the powdered peanut butter with the yogurt and it’d probably taste pretty similar to cheesecake (another food J loves).

I was right. This stuff isn’t good for a healthy dip; it’s just good. One serving contains nine grams of protein and, depending on the brand of powdered peanut butter you buy, it’s gluten free, too. In addition, the recipe is low in carbs and calories and contains plenty of healthy fat.

Unsure what powdered peanut butter is? It’s exactly what it sounds like: peanuts are made into powder instead of fat-laden butter. Most peanut powders contain around 85 percent less fat than their butter counterparts. They also have healthy fiber and protein.

A healthy two ingredient snack that tastes like a sinful dessert? Yup! This Chocolate Peanut Butter Cheesecake Protein Dip is as good for you as it is delicious.

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Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes

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Take cupcakes made from a jazzed-up chocolate cake mix, stuff them with rich and creamy chocolate ganache, and top with smooth peanut butter frosting. You’ve got Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes!

Take cupcakes made from a jazzed-up chocolate cake mix, stuff it with rich and creamy chocolate ganache, and top it with smooth peanut butter frosting. You've got Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes!

I volunteer to make the cupcakes any time there’s a baby shower at church. As a food blogger, I’m always looking for an excuse to bake and to test my recipes on others. I knew the most recent shower was for a couple expecting a baby girl, so I wracked my brain for some fun fruity flavor ideas. I had plenty of inspiration, but I kept coming back to chocolate.

Finally I decided to say to heck with the idea of a light and girly cupcake. I made these Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes instead. The cupcake recipe is the same as the one I used to make my Triple Chocolate Cupcakes; the ganache is the same, too. The frosting, though, is where things get interesting. I took my decadent cream cheese frosting and subbed for peanut butter for the cream cheese. The result was a smooth, delightfully-rich frosting that stole the cupcake show.

Take cupcakes made from a jazzed-up chocolate cake mix, stuff it with rich and creamy chocolate ganache, and top it with smooth peanut butter frosting. You've got Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes!

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Homemade Peanut Butter Cup Bars

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Homemade Peanut Butter Cup Bars are a no-bake, four-ingredient, gluten-free alternative to the packaged version. So easy, fast, and incredibly tasty!

Homemade Peanut Butter Cup Bars are a no-bake, four-ingredient, gluten-free alternative to the packaged version. So easy, fast, and incredibly tasty!

The combination of peanut butter and chocolate is downright irresistible. At least it is to J and me and, based on the number of people who love store-bought peanut butter cups, we’re just two of millions. I started making a homemade version several years ago. They were rich and smooth and one of the best things we’d ever eaten. Making them, drizzling the melted chocolate into individual muffin liners, was a little tedious, though.

Homemade Peanut Butter Cup Bars are a no-bake, four-ingredient, gluten-free alternative to the packaged version. So easy, fast, and incredibly tasty!

More than a year ago, I had the brilliant idea to make the recipe into bars, to skip the cupcake liners and use a sheet pan instead. Best. Idea. Ever. Now, a recipe that was already impossible to resist is also sinfully simple to make. These homemade peanut butter cup bars are just as good as the homemade peanut butter cups, but they come together so much more quickly. Bonus: they’re gluten free!

 

Homemade Peanut Butter Cup Bars are a no-bake, four-ingredient, gluten-free alternative to the packaged version. So easy, fast, and incredibly tasty!

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Banana Bread Protein Bites

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Banana bread protein bites are full of big banana flavor and filling protein. No gluten, dairy, or added sugar here!

Banana bread protein bites are full of big banana flavor and filling protein. No gluten, dairy, or added sugar here!

I used to make energy bites pretty often, way back before we had kids. I made homemade granola bars, too. It was a period when we had more time than money and I enjoyed experimenting in the kitchen, discovering homemade versions of store-bought favorites. The energy bites and granola bars I made were a hit, but sometime around baby number two’s arrival, it just became easier to buy that type of thing.

Fast forward to now. We just welcomed baby number three, but that hasn’t deterred my desire to feed my family more homemade snacks and fewer processed ones. For J and the kids, I want something they enjoy eating and don’t necessarily recognize as healthy. For myself, I want nutritious, calorie-dense snacks that give me the boost I need while nursing.

Banana bread protein bites are full of big banana flavor and filling protein. No gluten, dairy, or added sugar here!

That’s where these banana bread protein bites come in. First, they’re gluten-free (assuming your oats are). They don’t contain dairy or added sugar and, aside from the honey and peanut butter, they get their sweetness mostly from the ripe bananas. The bites themselves aren’t overly-sweet; they won’t be confused with a dessert, but they’re also unlikely to be turned down by my toddlers.

Banana bread protein bites are full of big banana flavor and filling protein. No gluten, dairy, or added sugar here!

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Chocolate Peanut Butter No-Bake Bars

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Chocolate peanut butter no-bake bars combine the mouthwatering richness of the classic cookies with the ease of making bars.

Who doesn’t remember these cookies from childhood?

Chocolate peanut butter no-bake bars combine the mouthwatering richness of the classic cookies with the ease of making bars.

My mom never made them much, but I have distinct memories of my Dad’s Mom, Granny, making treats like these cookies in the kitchen of her home in Mississippi. I remember my brothers and my cousins and I waiting impatiently for the cookies to set up, watching for that tell-tale change from wet to shiny that would signal they were ready to be devoured.

It’s entirely possible that we didn’t always wait for them to set up. In fact, way before the days of cake batter-flavored anything, my brothers and I pestered Granny so often for tastes of the cake batter she was preparing that she finally handed us the yellow Tupperware bowl full of batter, along with three spoons, and shooed us into the living room with strict instructions to not return until we’d emptied the bowl.

You may very well find yourself in the same situation Granny did when you make these chocolate peanut butter no-bake bars. The chocolate sauce is rich and thick; I doubt you’ll be able to resist dipping your finger- or a fresh strawberry, hint hint- in a couple times. After you’ve added the oatmeal and transferred the whole thing to a dish, feel free to sneak into a corner with a spoon and the saucepan to enjoy the remnants in peace.

Chocolate peanut butter no-bake bars combine the mouthwatering richness of the classic cookies with the ease of making bars.

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Easy Holiday Dessert Recipes

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This year, don’t waste time trying to impress everyone by replicating your grandmother’s famous recipe; knock their socks off with something new, like one of these easy holiday dessert recipes.

This year, don't waste time trying to impress everyone by replicating your grandmother's famous recipe; knock their socks off with something new, like one of these easy holiday dessert recipes.

Do you have a signature holiday dessert? If so, by all means, stick with that this year. You wouldn’t want to disappoint the people who’ve spent 364 days looking forward to it.

But maybe you don’t have a go-to holiday dessert recipe? Maybe you’re the one who always volunteers to bring paper products to the gathering. Or maybe your idea of “homemade” is arranging store-bought cookies on a platter. Maybe you’re banned from the kitchen ever since the fire incident of ‘o9.

Whatever your reason for foregoing holiday baking, it’s time that changed. The easy holiday dessert recipes compiled here are all easy and mouthwatering. Some of them don’t even require you to use the oven. Be careful, though; you just might find a new signature holiday dish.

Easy Holiday Dessert Recipes

Brown Sugar Pound Cake with Caramel Icing

Brown sugar pound cake with caramel icing is a rich, moist cake, flecked with toffee bits and smothered in an easy, decadent caramel sauce.

This pound cake is a decadent alternative to even the most indulgent pie. The cake itself is moist, buttery, and flecked with melty toffee bits. The whole thing is smothered with the kind of rich, gooey caramel icing that you haunts your dreams in all the best ways.

Peanut Butter Cup Bars

This year, don't waste time trying to impress everyone by replicating your grandmother's famous recipe; knock their socks off with something new, like one of these easy holiday dessert recipes.

If you don’t think it was possible for a four-ingredient dessert steal the show at a holiday gathering, give these bars a try. They’re ridiculously easy to put together- no baking!- but your friends and family will go crazy.

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Monster Cookies

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Monster cookies are chewy cookies packed with chocolate chips, oats, peanut butter, and M&Ms candies.

Monster cookies are chewy cookies packed with chocolate chips, oats, peanut butter, and M&Ms candies.

I grew up with a mom who rarely bought sweets. She’s a phenomenal baker, so she didn’t need to; she made everything we wanted from scratch. That included our birthday cakes, Christmas treats for teachers, and the most incredible chocolate chip cookies.

Her cookies are pretty famous in little Sweet Home, Oregon, and for good reason. They’re perfect. When I was younger, she never made a single batch. She always double or tripled the recipe because my siblings and our friends could never get enough.

These days, I love to whip up a batch of chocolate chip cookies, and I always use the tricks my mom taught me. Sometimes, though, I like to take the cookies to a new level. I’ve been known to do that with sea salt and peanut butter, but I’ve even been known to take it a step further.

Cue these monster cookies. I’m not sure what the official definition of monster cookies is, but I’ve always understood it to mean cookies that are loaded with all kinds of delightful extras. In this case, those extras are oats, M&Ms, and peanut butter. The result is a moist, chewy cookie that’s packed with flavor and decadence.

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salted peanut butter chocolate chip cookies

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It doesn’t get much better than these salted peanut butter chocolate chip cookies. Swirled with creamy peanut butter and stuffed with mini chocolate chips, they’re the cookies you know and love, but kicked up a couple notches.

Salted peanut butter chocolate chip cookies are swirled with creamy PB and stuffed with plenty of mini chocolate chips. Like regular cookies, but way better

I first made these cookies years ago, long before I ever had a blog. They popped up in my Time Hop recently and I was reminded how much I loved them.

My regular chocolate chip cookies are somewhat legendary. I’ll save the mouthwatering descriptions for this recipe, but trust me when I say they’re among the best chocolate chip cookies ever. I’ll post the recipe sometime.

Salted peanut butter chocolate chip cookies are swirled with creamy PB and stuffed with plenty of mini chocolate chips. Like regular cookies, but way better

There are times when you need an amped up version of regular recipe. That’s when you pull this guy out of your back pocket. The creamy peanut butter adds a smooth depth of flavor, while the mini chocolate chips ensure you get at least a few in each bite. Sprinkle baked cookies with sea salt for a classic salty-sweet profile.

Salted peanut butter chocolate chip cookies are swirled with creamy PB and stuffed with plenty of mini chocolate chips. Like regular cookies, but way better

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