peanut butter cups

When the weather heats up and I fancy making a sweet treat, I inevitably turn to raw desserts. The benefits: no oven needed, and the recipes are quick and simple.
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These are my family favourites: Peanut Butter Cups. Half an hour and a bit of stirring is all it takes to make these delicious morsels.

Makes 12-16 small cups

EQUIPMENT YOU'LL NEED
I use a silicone ice cube tray to set my peanut butter cups, any shape or size will do. If you use a tray meant for standard sized ice cubes you'll get 12-16 peanut butter cups from this recipe. If you have chocolate molds feel free to use them. I have also successfully used a small square container lined with baking paper; doing it this way means you'll have 1 large peanut butter cup slab, which you can then cut into squares when frozen.

Ingredients:

For Chocolate layer:
2 tbsp coconut oil, melted
3 tbsp raw cacao or alkalised cocoa powder (or more depending how rich you fancy it)
2 tbsp rice malt syrup, honey or maple syrup

For Peanut Butter layer:
1 tbsp coconut oil, melted
2 tbsp peanut butter 
1 tbsp rice malt syrup, honey or maple syrup
Pinch of salt 

Method:
Step 1. CHOCOLATE LAYER: Combine chocolate layer ingredients in a small saucepan and melt over low heat for a minute, just to enable the blending of ingredients smoothly together. 

Using a teaspoon, spoon chocolate mixture into your silicone tray/container of choice. You'll use about 2 tsp of mixture per peanut butter cup.

Place the silicon tray in the freezer so it can freeze while you make the peanut butter layer

Step 2. PEANUT BUTTER LAYER: Combine peanut butter layer ingredients in a small saucepan and melt over low heat for a minute, just to enable the blending of ingredients smoothly together. 

Retrieve your silicone tray from the freezer. Use a teaspoon to spoon peanut butter mixture on top of the now set chocolate layer.  Return tray to freezer.

In 15 mins your peanut butter cups are ready to devour! Remember to keep uneaten ones in the freezer - any desserts made with coconut oil rely on being frozen to keep their form.

Tip: spray measuring cups, measuring spoons and silicon mould with oil. It makes the syrup and nut butter behave much better, and you leave no residue behind.

PIMP MY RECIPE
*Use almond butter instead of peanut
*add a few drops of vanilla to the chocolate mixture 
*instead of cocoa powder, use 2-3 tbl chocolate drops. They will take a bit more melting but the result is deliciously decadent.