Homemade Peanut Butter Cups (no refined sugars!)

Homemade Peanut Butter Cups (no refined sugars!)

Homemade Peanut Butter Cups (no refined sugars!). These things are AMAZING!

There are only nineteen days until Easter.

(Cue bugged eyes from some of you… c’mon, admit it)

It really sneaks up on you, doesn’t it? It always catches me by surprise when it’s in March. I just feel like it’s an April holiday, ya know?

Although it has nothing at all to do with Jesus, one of the biggest parts of Easter for many (including us Jesus-lovers) is the chocolate! In my house growing up we always had the usual egg hunt with annual new jammies and a chocolate bunny, and a book. I loved it.

Whether it’s spiritual or just for fun – I want my kids to have some treats for Easter too. Unfortunately the usual Easter candy that you buy in stores is not so great for us. I’m not saying a little bit of sugar once in a while is gonna kill ya.

Unfortunately, however, that candy is not just a little bit of sugar. Between the high-fructose corn syrup and the regular sugar (often both are ingredients in the same product) most conventional chocolate and candy is pretty unhealthy. Then there are the artificial colours and dyes – those things have been proven to affect children’s behaviour – drastically in some cases.

It’s definitely a personal decision – even among the natural living/real food communities, some choose to go the conventional route for a rare occasion. For our family I choose to do what I can to make healthier treats that taste amazing (usually better!) that aren’t full of junk. (And yes, we compromise at other times in other areas!)

Anyway, on to the healthy decadence that I’m currently enjoying. I first got the idea of these when I saw a pin on Pinterest of fudge that was made in muffin cups. I thought of making my own peanut butter cups, so I played around and came up with something pretty darn yummy.

The chocolate part is based off a recipe I got from a friend (without a source given) so I googled it. I found that it was pretty well the same as this recipe on my friend Mindy’s blog (it’s a small interweb, I guess), and she based it off of The Nourishing Gourmet’s recipe, who based hers off of Sally Fallon’s in Nourishing Traditions! The peanut butter part I just totally made up, hoping it would work out (which, ohmygosh did it ever!)

You will love these homemade peanut butter cups!

Ingredients

for the chocolate part

1/2 cup coconut oil

1/2 cup cocoa

1/3 cup honey

1/2 cup almond butter

1 tablespoon butter*

for the peanut butter filling

1/2 cup peanut butter

1/3 cup honey

1/4 teaspoon sea salt

1 tablespoon butter*

*use coconut oil if you want it to be dairy-free

Instructions

1. Melt and stir all chocolate ingredients together over low heat.

2. In a separate pot, mix and stir all peanut butter filling ingredients together over low heat.

3. Prepare a muffin tin with muffin papers. I used mini muffin papers. (It made just over a dozen).

4. Pour some chocolate into each cup – less than half full.

5. Freeze for 15 minutes.

6. Spoon some peanut butter mixture on top of each frozen chocolate cup. Smooth it down to get into the cracks of the muffin paper so that it looks pretty. If you care about that sorta thing.

7. Freeze for 15 minutes.

8. Pour more chocolate on top of each cup to finish off.

9. Freeze for 15 minutes.

10. Once they are nice and firm, go ahead and store them in a sealed container in the fridge or freezer. They’ll stay fresh longer than it’ll take you to eat them! Enjoy!

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