Peanut Butter Kisses

One of my all-time favorite recipes to bring to parties, especially around the holidays, are peanut butter kiss cookies.  It's a recipe that many people already have and bake, but they're a guaranteed crowd pleaser every single time!  I mean, who doesn't love the peanut butter and chocolate combo?!  This past weekend, I brought them to Howie, Chris and Zach's Ugly Christmas Sweater Party, and was happy to take home a completely empty tin!  That's a success in my book!



I started by placing the wet ingredients - brown sugar, white sugar, Crisco butter-flavored shortening, peanut butter, vanilla and egg - in a large bowl, with the dry ingredients - flour, baking soda and salt - in a smaller bowl.  You also need a splash of milk, which stays on the side for now.  Before you start all the mixing, preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit so it's all ready when you are!

I creamed together the wet ingredients until it was perfectly smooth and creamy, then gradually added the dry ingredients plus 2 tablespoons of milk to the mixture.

It will gradually start to thicken into a perfectly delicious peanut butter dough that can be easily formed into balls.

Using the best kitchen tool, my hands, I rolled the cookies into about 1"-1.5" diameter balls.  It's really important to make sure that all of them are nearly the same size in order for them to cook evenly in the oven.  As if these cookies weren't already amazing, you roll the balls in white sugar to add a crispy crunch to the outside!  So hard to resist sampling at this point!

The cookies will take about 10-15 minutes to cook depending on your oven and the size of the cookies that you formed.  Mine were done in 13 minutes.  Word of precaution: make sure you have all of the Hershey Kisses unwrapped BEFORE you take the cookies out of the oven!  You have to press them in right when they come out so the chocolate melts into the cookie and can securely rest inside once it re-hardens.  Another word of precaution:  don't stack the cookies for at least 4 hours, maybe even longer.  I may have made that mistake when I thought the kisses were nearly hardened, and they weren't and I got chocolate everywhere!

Perfection.  Try them for your next holiday party!