Old-Fashioned Peanut Butter Bars
These Old-Fashioned Peanut Butter Bars are rich and sweet, with tons of peanut butter flavor and a blast of chocolate, thanks to chocolate chips in the batter and Hershey’s Kisses on top of each and every bar.
We’re adventurous cooks, and we love to try new things. That being said, there’s something to be said for time-honored favorites, too. When we want delicious, sweet peanut butter flavor for dessert or special events, we love going old-school and making these peanut butter bars.
Table of contents
❤️ Why You’ll Love This Recipe
- Simple Ingredients: You’ll only need some basic baking ingredients to make these squares.
- Easy: Just mix and bake. That’s it!
- Rich Flavor: These bars are full of rich, creamy peanut butter flavor.
- A Classic: This recipe is perfect for weeknight desserts, parties, or potlucks.
🛒Ingredients
We’ve made this list to help you save time on your next trip to the grocery store. You can find the full amounts needed in the printable recipe card at the bottom of the post.
- Butter – softened
- Granulated sugar
- Brown sugar – packed
- Creamy peanut butter
- Egg
- Vanilla extract
- All-purpose flour
- Baking soda
- Baking powder
- Salt
- Chocolate chips
- Hershey’s Kisses – unwrapped
🔪 How to Make Old-Fashioned Peanut Butter Bars
This is a quick overview of the steps needed to make this recipe. You can find the full instructions in the recipe card at the bottom of this post.
- Beat the butter and sugars until creamy.
- Add the remaining wet ingredients and mix well.
- Whisk the dry ingredients together and mix them with the wet ingredients.
- Fold in the chocolate chips.
- Spread the batter evenly in a prepared 9×13 baking dish and bake until golden brown.
- Cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Then, cut into 24 bars and place a Hershey’s Kiss on each bar.
🥄 Equipment
- Measuring cups and spoons
- Mixing bowls
- Hand mixer
- 9×13 baking dish
🥫 Storage
Store these peanut butter bars in an air-tight container at room temperature for up to 5 days. For longer storage, wrap them in plastic wrap and freeze them for up to 3 months in an air-tight, freezer-safe container or heavy-duty freezer bag.
What to Serve with Old-Fashioned Peanut Butter Bars
Serve these peanut butter bars alongside other sweet cookies and bars as part of a larger dessert table. Treats like butter pecan cookies, peanut butter cup cookie bars, and graham cracker toffee bark are all great options.
💭 Tips
- Fully soften your butter so it creams easily and mixes well with the other ingredients.
- Mix your dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until just combined. Don’t overdo it!
- Fold the chocolate chips into the dough to prevent forming excess gluten.
- Use a sharp knife for clean edges on your bars.
⁉️ FAQ
Do you have questions about this recipe? Here are the answers to the most commonly asked questions.
Cookie bars are a variation of cookies in which the dough is pressed into a dish and cooked in a single layer, then cut into squares before serving.
Conventional peanut butter is best for cookies. It’s very difficult to mix the fat and solids in all-natural peanut butter fully, and it can impact the texture of your cookies or bars.
Crumbly cookie bars are usually the result of using too much flour. This happens when the flour is measured by scooping it out directly with the measuring cup. To avoid compacting and using too much, loosely scoop the flour into the cup with a spoon and level it off with a knife.
🍽 More Recipes
Do you enjoy peanut butter? Then try these delicious recipes.
🧾Recipe Card
Want to make this recipe? Print the recipe card below, or pin this recipe, so you can find it later.
Old-Fashioned Peanut Butter Bars
Equipment
- Measuring Cups and Spoons
- mixing bowls
- Hand mixer
- 9×13 baking dish
Ingredients
- ½ cup butter softened
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- ½ cup brown sugar packed
- ½ cup creamy peanut butter
- 1 large egg
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 ½ cups all purpose flour
- ¾ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ⅛ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup chocolate chips semi sweet or milk chocolate
- 24 Hershey’s Kisses unwrapped
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350F. Grease a 9×13-inch baking pan with non-stick cooking spray; set aside.
- In a large mixing bowl, Beat together the butter, granulated sugar, and brown sugar with an electric mixer until well combined.
- Add the peanut butter, egg, and vanilla and mix well.
- Stir in the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.
- Fold in the chocolate chips.
- Scoop the batter into the prepared baking pan and spread out evenly edge to edge.
- Bake at 350F for 20-25 minutes until golden brown.
- Cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then cut into 24 bars. Place a Hershey’s Kiss in the center of each bar.
Disclaimer
Any nutritional data I provide is an approximation and actual dietary information can vary based on ingredients and proportion sizes.
