Peanut Butter Yum Yum Bombs

photo by: John Young

Peanut Butter Yum Yum Bombs

Generally, I can live without peanut butter, and I can live without chocolate. I know, I know. I’m not normal. Take away my woman card. It’s unholy. I get it.

However, at holiday time, I get an urge for what I like to call Peanut Butter Yum Yum Bombs, and I have to have one. Just one. Maybe two. I make the recipe, lick the spoon, eat my Yum Yum Bomb, and give the rest away to the normal people I know who love peanut butter and chocolate and particularly love them together. This is like a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup on steroids.

It’s easy to make, in the sense that you don’t have to heat up the oven and you usually will have the ingredients lying around if you are any kind of baker or if you have small children. They’re tricky to make in that they require significant freezer space as part of the process. I do not have said freezer space, and therefore mine look much messier and are much fussier to create than they would be had I a freezer that was made in, oh, this century.

If you take these to your friends’ New Year’s Eve party, they will all kiss you at midnight. I’m just sayin’. Go for it. It’s your last hurrah before the resolution diet begins.

Peanut Butter Yum Yum Bombs

2 cups creamy peanut butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup butter, room temp
1/4 tsp salt
4 or 5 cups powdered sugar
1 bag semi-sweet chocolate chips
3 tablespoons shortening

Mix your peanut butter, butter, salt and vanilla together with a spoon or beaters. Add the powdered sugar slowly until it’s completely incorporated. Chill the bowl for about 20 minutes; then form balls with the mixture. I like mine sort of big. It makes them harder to dip, but they’re really impressive to eat. Insert a toothpick in the top of each one.

Lay the balls on a cookie sheet covered in parchment or wax paper. Here is where it is best to freeze them, but I just have to manage with refrigerating for about an hour.

When you’re ready, just microwave the chocolate chips with the shortening until the result is smooth. I do it in 30-second increments so as not to scorch the chocolate. It’s good to do this in a smaller bowl so the chocolate is deeper, not spread thin across a wide bottom. This makes the dipping process easier.

Pull the peanut butter balls from the freezer or fridge and dip in melted chocolate. I use a spoon to sort of help the chocolate get up around the sides so the toothpick doesn’t have to do so much of the work.

Once they are all dipped, return to the refrigerator to harden.

This makes about 40 2-inch balls.

Enjoy!