Buckeyes

Submitted by Baking Carly

"Buckeyes are the BEST candy in the fall when you live in Ohio! ESPECIALLY during Michigan week :)"

 

• Ready In: 2hrs
• Ingredients: 6
• Yields: 60 buckeyes
• Serves: 60

ingredients

• 1⁄2 cup margarine
• 1 1⁄2 cups creamy peanut butter
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 1⁄2 cups powdered sugar
• 20 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 2 tablespoons shortening

directions

1. Cream the margarine and peanut butter until smooth.
2. Add the vanilla extract and blend until smooth.
3. Add the powdered sugar 1/2 - 1 cup at a time, blending well and scraping the bowl with each addition.
4. Chill the peanut butter "dough" until easily handled (if not, your hands will get REALLY messy!).
5. Once chilled, roll the peanut butter dough into 1 inch balls (you should be able to get about 6-8 dozen).
6. Melt 10 ounces of chocolate with 1 tablespoon of shortening in either a double boiler, or on medium power in the microwave.
7. Transfer the melted chocolate into a deep bowl.
8. With a toothpick, dip each peanut butter ball into the chocolate to cover it about 3/4. There should be a circle of peanut butter showing on top. Set each buckeye on a cookie sheet lined with wax paper to cool. I tend to put the sheet into the freezer for a few minutes because it prevents the chocolate from sticking.
9. If needed, melt the remaining 10 ounces of chocolate and 1 tbsp of shortening. (The original recipe I used said to use just one batch of the chocolate, but I definitely had to run out and get more chocolate to finish!).

Reviews

[tendollarwine]

These turned out really great! My grandma used to make these when I was a kid and I never got her recipe (probably because she never wrote them down!). These are a nice reminder of the past. I will say that they were a bit too sugary, so next time, i'm going to do 2 cups instead of 2.5...and I didn't have the same problem that other reviewers did. The peanut butter mixture was nice a firm.

 

[vsbaker]

Dough was way too creamy/sticky even after refrigerating. I also didn't get 60 - I only got about 4 dozen - and I made my balls quarter size or smaller. I also dip the balls while the chocolate is in the saucepan/double boiler so it doesn't harden and have to be re-melted.

 

[chirospasm]

The peanut butter mixture was so soft that it simply could not be handled, much less rolled into balls. I tried refrigerating it (not firm enough) and freezing it (too firm, but softened into the consistency of butter if tried to roll). I ended up cutting the peanut butter into chunks and dipping them into the somewhat cooled melted chocolate, but even then the peanut butter melted. I don't know if there's way too much margarine or way not enough sugar.

 

[anonymous23]

Go Bucks!!! Can't wait to try this recipe for the people around here (trivia bit: in British Columbia, buckeyes are apparently called horse chestnuts.)