Salted Chocolate Chunk Peanut Butter Cookie Bars; soft chewy peanut butter cookie bars with melting pockets of nutty dark chocolate.
Calling all fellow soft cookie lovers.
If you’re never quite satisfied with the amount of soft, chewy, gooeyness from bakery or homemade cookies, I’ve got you. These cookie bars, like any of the cookie bar recipes on this site, encapsulate and emphasise the best parts of a good chocolate chunk cookie.
The slightest crispness at the edges gives way to a truffle-soft centre. Sweet brown sugar and salty peanut butter mingle beautifully together in every mouthful. Puddles of melting dark chocolate perfectly punctuate their deliciously stodgy cookie dough cradle. These Salted Chocolate Chunk Peanut Butter Cookie Bars are a peanut-butter-and-chocolate-lovers’ dream.
Prefer watching to reading? Click here for a recipe video for these cookie bars instead!
Not only are cookie bars unbelievably dreamy to eat, they’re also a dream to make.
This recipe is so simple and straight-forward that even beginner bakers could take it on. None of the faffing around rolling out and evenly spacing perfect balls of cookie dough. No stressfully accurate baking time. Simply mix up your cookie dough, spread it out into a tray, and bake for roughly half an hour.
These Salted Chocolate Chunk Peanut Butter Cookie Bars are pretty difficult to mess up. Baking the dough in a tray allows for a more forgiving baking experience, less washing up, and allows you to slice them as you like. Whether you prefer fat squares, skinny rectangles, or party-sized bites, it’s up to you! They’ll feel and taste marvellous regardless.
You won’t have to spend an arm and a leg on fancy equipment or on expensive ingredients. Basic store-cupboard wares should get you through (if, like me, you always have an abundance of peanut butter to hand of course!).
The most important ingredient, as is always the case in chocolate-heavy treats, is good chocolate. If you ever want to level-up your baking without any extra effort, use the best quality chocolate you can afford!
Thanks to the lovely team at Willie’s Cacao, I was gifted some bags of their cooking chocolate to play with. As expected, this stuff is not only delicious but ideal for baking.
In these Salted Chocolate Chunk Peanut Butter Cookie Bars I used their 72% Rio Caribe dark chocolate chef’s drops. The chocolate has a bold, nutty, and almost coffee-like flavour that really stands up to the bold peanut butter and brown sugar flavours of these bars. You’ll find they come in handy resealable 1kg bags, and can be used for all kinds of sweet and savoury purposes. With this recipe, I stirred the drops straight into the cookie dough, and added a few on top for decoration before baking. It’s amazing how professional it can make even a simple treat taste.
I’ve loved eating chocolate from Willie’s Cacao for years now. They are frontrunners of the UK craft chocolate market, ensuring ethical environmental and labour practices in their bean-to-bar process. It’s chocolate you can truly feel good about snacking on or baking with, and it’s worlds apart from the nasty bitter dark chocolate you’ll often find in supermarkets!
If you’d like to try some of their cooking chocolate for yourself, you can find it here.
I really hope you’ll love these Salted Chocolate Chunk Peanut Butter Cookie Bars as much as we have, and thanks as always for popping by.
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To make these Salted Chocolate Chunk Peanut Butter Cookie Bars, simply follow the recipe below:
Salted Chocolate Chunk Peanut Butter Cookie Bars
Ingredients
- 120g (8 tbsp) softened butter
- 150g (¾ cup) soft brown sugar
- 150g (¾ cup) caster sugar
- 1 large egg
- 250g (1 cup) creamy smooth or chunky peanut butter
- 250g (2 cups) plain flour
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
- 250g (9 oz) dark chocolate chunks (I use Willie’s Cacao 72% Rio Caribe dark chocolate chef’s drops)
- Sea salt for sprinkling (optional)
Instructions
- Preheat your oven – 180 C / 160 C fan / 350 F / gas mark 4.
- Grease and line a 18cm x 25cm (7in x 10in), or 20cm x 20cm (8in x 8in), baking tin with greaseproof paper.
- In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugars until well combined.
- Add the egg and beat again until well incorporated.
- Add the peanut butter and beat again.
- Stir in your flour, bicarbonate of soda, salt, and chocolate chunks until a dough forms. Try not to eat it all.
- Use the back of a spoon, or your clean hands, to press the cookie dough into a flat layer in your lined tray.
- Bake the tray of dough for 30 minutes. The dough should look puffed and dry on top.
- Once baked, sprinkle over a little more sea salt and allow the tray of cookie to cool for at least 30 minutes before moving to a wire rack to cool completely.
- Use a sharp knife to slice the baked tray of cookie into square or rectangular bars.
- Enjoy!
BE A MAVERICK: why not try this recipe using almond butter to switch up the flavour?
These Salted Chocolate Chunk Peanut Butter Cookie Bars will keep well in an airtight container or on a covered cake stand for up to 5 days, but are best enjoyed fresh!
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Absolutely incredible!! Soft, chocolatey, crisp on the top, the perfect blend of nutty, sweet and salty. These are everything you’ve ever wanted in a cookie!
thanks so much, Danielle, glad you enjoyed!