Chocolate Peanut Butter Balls
Oh, yes. I went full-on tacky Christmas via PicMonkey. If you can't flaunt your tacky feathers at Christmas, when can you? I missed National Ugly Christmas Sweater Day last week...which was a total bummer. Mom has SO MANY Christmas sweaters covered in glitter, snowmen, and pom poms that I could have won a dozen ugly Christmas sweater awards just from walking outside my house. Mom still wears them non-ironically. She's literally the cutest.
Since being home and blissed out for the holidays, I've helped mom make at least 400 chocolate peanut butter balls (also known more commonly as "Buckeyes" to many folks-except we cover ours fully in chocolate). They're absolutely a Christmas tradition in our house (the recipe is from an old church cookbook circa 1978). Ever since I can remember, I've helped roll the balls and dip them in chocolate, making a total mess of the kitchen a la Lucy & Ethel. While they do take some patience to make, we love putting "Christmas in Dixie" on repeat, reminiscing about holidays past, and keeping our peanut butter ball assembly line tradition alive. We're all professional dippers, except I lack patience as the years go by (some of my balls aren't really balls after a while). Come to think of it, I don't even really eat many of the ones we make year after year...they all end up in little tins as Christmas gifts for the mailman or the friendly and ever-so-patient post office lady. Everybody deserves a little 'thank you' at Christmastime. No tastier thank you than these decadent treats!
Chocolate Peanut Butter Balls -Makes roughly 100 balls per recipe-
Ingredients: 1 1/3 box of powdered sugar 1 16 oz. jar of Jif peanut butter 2 sticks salted butter (softened) 1 bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips 1/3 block of Gulf Wax (for keeping the chocolate smooth & shiny--you won't taste the wax & it's totally fine to eat!)
Directions: 1| In a stand mixer, beat together the butter, peanut butter, and powdered sugar until combined into a soft, rollable dough. 2| Roll a small scoop of the peanut butter mixture by hand into small 1 inch balls and place on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet. Place balls into the refrigerator to chill for 2 hours before dipping in chocolate. 3| In a double boiler on low heat, melt chocolate chips and Gulf Wax together, stirring as it melts. Pull peanut butter balls out of the refrigerator just before dipping (if they get too soft while dipping, just pop them back into the fridge to firm up again). Use a toothpick to stick the ball and dip into the warm chocolate. Use a spoon to help cover the ball completely with chocolate. Use a toothpick to fill in the hole with chocolate left after pulling out the toothpick. 4| Place chocolate covered balls back into the refrigerator to set (roughly 30 minutes) before eating. 5| ENJOY with a tall glass of milk!
Ingredients: 1 1/3 box of powdered sugar 1 16 oz. jar of Jif peanut butter 2 sticks salted butter (softened) 1 bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips 1/3 block of Gulf Wax (for keeping the chocolate smooth & shiny--you won't taste the wax & it's totally fine to eat!)
Directions: 1| In a stand mixer, beat together the butter, peanut butter, and powdered sugar until combined into a soft, rollable dough. 2| Roll a small scoop of the peanut butter mixture by hand into small 1 inch balls and place on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet. Place balls into the refrigerator to chill for 2 hours before dipping in chocolate. 3| In a double boiler on low heat, melt chocolate chips and Gulf Wax together, stirring as it melts. Pull peanut butter balls out of the refrigerator just before dipping (if they get too soft while dipping, just pop them back into the fridge to firm up again). Use a toothpick to stick the ball and dip into the warm chocolate. Use a spoon to help cover the ball completely with chocolate. Use a toothpick to fill in the hole with chocolate left after pulling out the toothpick. 4| Place chocolate covered balls back into the refrigerator to set (roughly 30 minutes) before eating. 5| ENJOY with a tall glass of milk!
Do you have any holiday treat traditions? Share them here!
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