The Best Peanut Butter Cookies

I’m excited to show you how to make the best peanut butter cookies ever! It’s my sister-in-law Pat’s classic peanut butter cookie recipe with Hershey’s Chocolate Kisses. Now they make dark chocolate kisses that I can use since they’re my favorite! Love it!

This is really a tribute to her for not only being a wonderful cook, but also for being an awesome Aunt to my girls when they were growing up in Utah, and into their adult life as well.

I’m updating this recipe from July 2016. That seems like such a long time ago.

Pat passed away a few years ago, she would always have a treat for them when we visited her. I still remember her using her apron to wipe their noses because they had fallen outside and came in crying. She always had her arms open to love everyone.

The Best Peanut Butter Cookies

In case you missed my other Peanut Butter Recipes:

• Oatmeal Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars
• Peanut Butter Chocolate Bars

My Cookie Recipe Book

As I read through this recipe in my recipe book, I could see that it makes several cookies. Of course, it depends on the size of the cookie scoop, but I usually get 36 cookies from this recipe. This must be why we always looked forward to her bringing them to the family reunions each year because we could each have more than one cookie!!

Today I am cutting the recipe down to make only 36 cookies. It seems like 48 cookies is a lot these days! LOL!

Items You May Need In The Kitchen:

• Mixing Bowl or Stand Mixer
• Cookie Scoop
• Cookie Sheets
• Parchment Paper or Silpat Mat
• Cookie Spatula
• Measuring Cup(s)
• Measuring Spoons

Ingredients – Peanut Butter Cookies

Dry Ingredients

• All-Purpose White flour (I use bread flour): You can use all-purpose flour, but I find the peanut butter cookies come out fluffier with white bread flour. And, my bread flour has more protein than other flour varieties, which I appreciate when making any of my pastries or bread recipes.
• Baking Soda: Adds carbon dioxide to the dough, which helps to create a delicious soft and chewy cookie.
• Sea Salt: Used to enhance the flavors of the other ingredients, and to help offset the flavor of the sugar.
• White Granulated Sugar: Used to maintain moisture, creating a softer cookie, and adding sweetness and flavor.
• Brown Sugar: A mixture of granulated white sugar and molasses. It’s added for flavor and to help maintain moisture. It caramelizes as it bakes, creating a robust rich flavor that makes this peanut butter cookie truly incredible!
• Hershey Kisses: A popular and delicious small piece of chocolate candy in the shape of a teardrop with a flat bottom. Each piece is individually wrapped with foil. Made with sugar, chocolate, milk, soy lecithin, cocoa butter, lactose, milk fat, and artificial flavor.

Wet Ingredients

• Salted or Unsalted Butter (softened): Due to the fat content, butter helps to produce softer peanut butter cookies and enriches the flavor; it helps to keep the cookies from crumbling. Butter prevents the eggs, or any moist ingredient, from evaporating, which creates moist, soft, and velvety cookies. Due to the added sea salt in this recipe, you don’t need to use butter that contains added salt.
• Creamy Peanut Butter: A savory, high protein, a spread made from ground, dry-roasted peanuts with sugar, salt, and oils added.
• Eggs: Great protein source, helps bind the cookie dough together, creating moist and soft peanut butter cookies. Increases browning during the cooking process. Adds a deliciously rich flavor and helps to extend the life of the cookies.
• Vanilla Extract: Adds and enhances the flavors of the creamy peanut butter, sugar, brown sugar, egg, flour, and Hershey’s Kisses.

Softest Peanut Butter Cookies

Step One: Gather Ingredients – Preheat the Oven – Grease Cookie Sheets

Gather the ingredients so you’re ready to make these yummy peanut butter cookies! Preheat the oven to (375°F) = (190°C) degrees. Allow the butter to soften at room temperature.

You can grease the pan, use parchment paper, or use a Silpat liner. A handy approach is to skip the vegetable spray and use this mat forever! Silpat Liner or Parchment Paper.

Step Two: Cream The Ingredients

Using an electric mixer or stand mixer on medium speed, cream together the butter, white granulated sugar, brown sugar, eggs, baking soda, sea salt, peanut butter, and vanilla extract.

Whip Until Creamed

Step Three: Add the Flour

Gradually add the flour until the flour mixture is blended well. How much flour you add will determine the texture of the cookie. I’ve found the amount shown in the recipe works great for how I like mine.

Step Four: Shape the Dough into Cookie Balls

Once blended, shape the cookie dough into 1-inch balls and place them on a greased cookie sheet, baking sheet with parchment paper, or mat as mentioned above. I use a 1/8 cup cookie scoop to make these yummy cookies. Cookie Scoops and my favorite cookie spatula: OXO Good Grips Silicone Cookie Spatula

Step Five: Bake the Cookies

It’s time to bake the cookies! Bake for 10-12 minutes in the preheated oven. Depending on the size of the dough balls you make, the cooking time may vary.

Step Six: After Baking add the Hershey Kisses

Next, remove the foil from the Hershey Kisses. You may want to chill the “kisses” because they may start to melt. After baking, immediately add an unwrapped chocolate kiss in the center of each cookie. By doing so, the “kisses” melt just a bit into the hot peanut butter cookies, which helps them to stick. So delicious!

Finished Product

Remove the baking sheets from the oven and carefully place the cookies on a wire rack or serving tray.

The Best Peanut Butter Cookies Recipe

How Should I Store Peanut Butter Cookies?

Once you’ve made these Peanut Butter Cookies, you may be wondering how you can store them. Wait until they have reached room temperature and then put them in an airtight container. If stored properly, they’ll stay fresh for around a week. 

How Long Do Peanut Butter Cookies Stay Fresh?

In my home, peanut butter cookies are gobbled up so quickly that I seldom have to worry about how long they’ll stay fresh, which I’m grateful for. If they’re stored properly in an airtight container, they should stay fresh for about a week.

Can I Freeze Peanut Butter Cookies?

These peanut butter cookies freeze really well! The cookie dough freezes nicely too if you want to bake the cookies later. Be sure to freeze the dough in an airtight container.

Why are peanut butter cookies called Peanut Butter Blossoms?

This is such a fun story! Back in the 1950s in Ohio, a woman named Freda Smith was cooking chocolate chip peanut butter cookies for her grandchildren. Halfway through making the cookie dough, she realized that she didn’t have any chocolate chips! She came up with the brilliant idea to use some Hershey Kisses from her pantry and plop one on top of each of the cookies! It was such a hit that she ended up entering the cookies in a Pillsbury cooking competition. She called them “Black-Eyed Susans.” Pillsbury actually renamed the cookies to “Peanut Butter Blossoms.” Although the cookies didn’t win the competition, they’ve become well-known around the world and have become a family favorite for many! Some still call them Peanut Butter Blossom Cookies. In my home, we call them Peanut Butter Cookies with a Kiss. So fun!

What makes a peanut butter cookie soft vs crisp?

It’s important to realize, moisture is key to keeping a peanut butter cookie chewy or soft vs being on the crispy side! Equally important, the butter and peanut butter in the peanut butter cookie dough contains water, milk solids, and oils which help to create a soft or chewy peanut butter cookie. Also, the thickness of the dough is an important thing to consider. As I have noted before, I like to use a 1/8 cup cookie scoop to measure my cookie dough balls for this recipe and it makes a 1-inch ball. I feel that that size ball is the perfect size to help maintain the moisture as it cooks and as it takes the shape of the cookie.

If you prefer crispier sugar cookies, for example, use a smaller scoop. A thin cookie won’t be as soft, so you decide what texture you like your cookies to have. Please make sure to watch the baking sheet in the oven to see when the cookie edges are a little darker, not too much, just a little. They’ll cook in less time because they are thinner.

Check Out These Delicious Cookie Recipes!

• Frosted Sugar Cookies
• Chewy Molasses Cookies Just Like Grandma Made
• How To Make The Best Sugar Cookies Ever
• Soft Oatmeal Cookies
• The Best Chocolate Chip Parfait Cookies
• Chewy Molasses Cookies Just Like Grandma Made

Final Word

Please let me know if you try making these peanut butter kiss cookies! They are the perfect Christmas cookie that is so fun to take to any friend or family get-together.

This recipe is truly the best peanut butter cookie recipe! I love how the flavor of the peanut butter combined with the sea salt, vanilla extract, brown sugar, granulated white sugar, butter, and the Hershey Kiss make a very creamy, chocolatey treat!

I’d love to hear if you enjoyed this recipe! Let’s continue to cook from scratch. It’s so important to teach these skills to our young loved ones. May God Bless this World, Linda.