Peanut Butter Cup Cookies

"Jenn, we have to talk."

This is what one of my friends said to his darling girlfriend after trying a peanut butter cup surprise cookie at our first tailgate of the season. These can thus also be called "homewrecker cookies." Yes they were just that good. (And yes, Jenn, if you are reading this, the recipe is all yours. Make him a happy man!)

Even better than their ability to make a man question what "love" really means is how easy they are! I almost completed both batches in the time it took the boy to get stuff from the liquor store! Granted, he does enjoy taking his time at the liquor store ("hmm, do I want this whiskey, or that whiskey?") but still, they were quick, great cookies.
I must say that here the term "cookie" is used loosely since they are baked in mini muffin tins and I gave them a frosting. Some may thus argue that they are more like mini-cupcakes, but I still think they are cookies from the texture.

As for the frosting, you can obviously omit it, but I felt it added a great extra kick of chocolate fudge. I decided to add it to cover the reeses, to make it a sort of surprise. It worked! One guy came up to me and said "Shoot! I didn't even realize there was a reeses in here! Awesome!" So my version is a peanut butter cup surprise cookie, though you can leave out the surprise by ommitting the frosting.

Tips for next time (and trust me, there WILL be a next time): freeze all the mini reeses cups before unwrapping them, because it makes it much easier and neater. Unwrap all the reeses before you put the cookies in the oven. It takes a lot longer to unwrap 40-50 mini reeses cups than you would think, and, in fact, i think this is the most labor-intensive part. Make the cookies big enough so that after they puff a little in the oven, you can put a mini reeses cup almost all the way inside. My first batch was a little small, so it was harder to get the peanut butter cup inside.Peanut Butter Cup Surprise Cookies
Cookies
INGREDIENTS
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1 egg, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons milk
40 miniature chocolate covered peanut butter cups, unwrapped
DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).
Sift together the flour, salt and baking soda; set aside.
Cream together the butter, sugar, peanut butter and brown sugar until fluffy. Beat in the egg, vanilla and milk. Add the flour mixture; mix well.
Shape into 40 balls and place each into an ungreased mini muffin pan.
Bake at 375 degrees for about 8 minutes. Remove from oven and immediately press a mini peanut butter cup into each ball. Cool and carefully remove from pan. (This is where it helps to have used a flexible silicone pan, not metal. Mine were easy to get out because I could push out the bottom, but it would be hard with metal pans)
Refrigerate completely then frost to cover the peanut butter cups, the refrigerate again.

Frosting (approximate since I didn't measure)
1 cup chocolate chips
2 tbsp butter
1 tbsp light corn syrup
½ tsp vanilla extract
Melt first 3 ingredients together. Stir in vanilla. Frost cool cookies.