Happy Peanut Butter Cookie Day!!

June 12^th is National Peanut Butter Cookie Day. I love peanut butter and I love cookies. It’s also my close friends birthday today and she loves peanut butter cookies too! So, I just had to celebrate this national day this year!

There are so many “national” days that I can’t and I won’t ever try to keep them up with all of them. But as I said just above today was just too good to pass up.

I have made a lot of peanut butter cookies in my short baking career and there is only so much you can do to a peanut butter cookie.

Making them taste like, a childhood favorite, Nutter Butters is an ingenious idea! They are huge so it will probably be a better idea to make them smaller then I did, as I've ended up halving them. No way I can eat one on my own the size I've made them! The filling I could eat by itself. I love peanut butter. I've said that already. My fickle heart talking again…

These come from Hedy Goldsmith and her book Baking Out Loud. I found the recipe in more the one place all over the net. As they are on the cover I am assuming they were like her hit single that was released to the press to give everyone a taster of her book.

Anyway I have given it to here, with my own commentary in the directions! Happy National Peanut Butter Day!! Happy Birthday Lauren!!

Peanut Butter Cookies

1 cup plain flour

½ tsp baking soda

1 cup rolled oats

¼ cup salted peanuts

114g unsalted butter, at room temp

½ cup (packed) light brown sugar

½ cup granulated sugar

½ tsp salt (kosher)

½ cup creamy peanut butter, at room temp

1 large egg, at room temp

1 tsp vanilla bean paste or extract

1. Preheat your oven to 190C/375F and line your tray(s) with parchment paper/nonstick liners.
2. Sift the flour and baking soda in a large bowl, then add the oats and peanuts.
3. Beat the butter for a few minutes, once it’s smooth add the brown sugar, granulated sugar, and salt and beat for about 5 minutes until light and fluffy. Scrape down the sides before adding the peanut butter, beat until just combined. Then add the flour and beat until just combined. We don’t want any over mixing!
4. Using a tablespoon shape the dough into balls about the size of a walnut or if you’re like me the size of a golf ball. Place them on your lined baking sheet about 2 inches apart and smoosh them slightly down with the palm of your hand. Apparently you should have 36 cookies to make 18 sandwiches, I had like 24 so only like 12 sandwiches.
5. Bake them 11-13 minutes, if you have more then one baking sheet about half way through switch from top to bottom and turn them around to ensure even baking. Once they are golden brown around the edges they are ready!
6. Let them cool completely on a cooling rack.

Peanut butter filling

3 cups icing sugar

145g unsalted butter, at room temp

¾ cup creamy peanut butter, at room temp

1 ¼ tsp vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract

½ tsp salt (kosher)

Place everything in the bowl of your mixer and beat for a bout 3 minutes until it’s soft and smooth. Once it’s all come together gather it all together and on your counter shape into an 18 inch log. However I did not have enough cookies to sandwich together 18… see step 4 above. Once it’s a log cut into 1 inch pieces. Place the filling pieces on one side of half the cookies and sandwich with the remaining cookies! Gently press down so that the filling reaches the edge. Store in an airtight container for up to 3 days! I doubt they will last that long! 

notes: National Peanut Board; Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies; Peanut Butter Blossoms; my Baking Out Loud review I'm watching MTV Hits Kelly (Clarkson) vs Ke$ha top 10 not really sure why? They really aren't comparable.