This recipe… these Peanut Butter Balls are just sublime. My sister and I have fond memories of these delicacies appearing at our house and at our grandmother’s house during the holidays. For this reason they are to me a Christmastime treat, even though the ingredients are on hand year-round.
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| Still chipping away at the Callebaut. |
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| Literally! |
I remember one year at Gram’s house a tall glass jar was filled with them. My sister and I ate in one sitting all but two or three of the Peanut Butter Balls in that jar! (That was when my mother caught us and made us stop.)
There are lots of recipes out there for treats like these, often under the name of Buckeyes. I am sharing here the recipe as it was given to us from our grandmother.
However, one ingredient that I did not use was the paraffin wax. It’s listed in her recipe and I remember making them as a kid and melting the wax in with the chocolate… the chocolate coating used to set up really quickly and had a lovely shine! These days it doesn’t seem like a good idea to include wax, and I also worry that others would not want to eat them knowing they contained paraffin. It is food-grade, but it’s also wax! A quick internet search revealed mixed opinions. So, I list it in my recipe as optional and I left it out of the batch I made. Better to be safe.
They taste heavenly without it and who cares if they’re not shiny!
Peanut Butter Balls
Ingredients:
1 1-lb. box confectioners sugar
2 cups creamy peanut butter
1/2 c. (1 stick) butter
1 tsp. vanilla extract
12 oz. semi-sweet chocolate
Optional: 1/4 bar paraffin wax
Directions:
Cream together the confectioners sugar, peanut butter, butter and vanilla. From this mixture roll 1-1/2″ balls and place onto a baking sheet lined with wax paper. Refrigerate the balls for 3-4 hours.
In the top of a double-boiler, heat and stir the chocolate (and the wax, if you’re using it) until it’s melted and smooth. Use toothpicks to lower the peanut butter balls one at a time into the chocolate and coat them thoroughly. (It also works to use a fork to lower them into and roll them in the chocolate.) Place the balls back on the wax paper and leave for 1-2 hours until cooled and set.
Store in an airtight container for up to one week, if by some remarkable chance they do not all get eaten in the first 24 hours!
These look good. I think I’d probably make them without the wax. LOL Thanks for sharing at Food on Friday!
Yummm, but what’s wrong with a little parafin 🙂
It never hurt us when we were kids so how bad could it be! 🙂