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Peanut Butter Cup Gooey Cookie Bars are chocolate chip cookie bars filled with peanut butter cups and gooey peanut butter filling!
These are a peanut butter explosion in one of the best cookie bar recipes EVER.
You guys: Peanut Butter Cup Gooey Bars. These are going to be your BFF, promise.
Y’all know how much I like my gooey bar recipes. I’m constantly dreaming up new versions because…Can’t stop won’t stop.
Today I married my Chocolate Chip Cookie Gooey Bars and my love of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.
I didn’t even know what to call these: they’re cookie bars filled with gooey peanut butter and peanut butter cups.
These are INSANE – and insanely easy:
- My best ever Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe
- Filled with peanut butter sweetened condensed milk
- And peanut butter cups
Table of Contents
What are these cookie bars?
My version of gooey bar is a cookie (or cake) bar. Half the dough is pressed into the pan, then it’s filled with sweetened condensed milk and topped with the rest of the dough.
I’ve made these in SO MANY ways, with cake mix and from scratch, and all different flavors and fillings, but THIS one is my favorite.
Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough
The base of the cookie bars starts with a double recipe of my favorite chocolate chip cookie dough. That recipe is my old standby and it produces the best chocolate chip cookies ever.
Since my cookie dough is made with melted butter you can easily stir it together in one bowl with a spoon or spatula. Simply stir the butter and sugars, then add in the eggs, baking soda, salt and vanilla, and then the flour.
For chocolate chips you have choices:
- Use regular chocolate chips (any kind)
- Use mini chocolate chips
- Use a combination of chocolate and peanut butter chips
- Use chopped peanut butter cups
Trader Joe’s chocolate chips are my favorite – they stay melty and gooey even after the cookies cool.
PRO TIP
Peanut Butter Gooey Filling
My normal gooey bar filling is plain sweetened condensed milk, but for these bars I wanted a gooey peanut butter filling, so I mixed peanut butter with the SCM. This adds peanut butter flavor to every bite of these cookie bars.
I also filled the bars with miniature Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. You can use any peanut butter cup size, just chop them if you use bigger ones than the minis.
How to layer gooey cookie bars
Peanut Butter Cup Gooey Bars are simple to assemble: just press half the dough in the bottom of the pan. It’s pretty easy to do this, since it’s a pretty liquidy dough right after mixing.
The peanut butter sweetened condensed milk gets drizzled over the top, then add the peanut butter cups.
Drop pieces of the rest of the dough all over the top. It won’t be solid but it’ll bake together in the oven.
When they bake up they become rich and gooey and so peanut buttery! Each bar is like a little meal that you can’t stop eating. Get out your glass of milk with these babies!
I can think of 100 reasons why you need to make the Peanut Butter Cup Gooey Bars recipe today. #1: because you just can’t NOT make them.
Other gooey bar recipes:
- Chocolate Chip Cookie Gooey Bars
- Funfetti Gooey Bars
- Peanut Butter Cookie Gooey Bars
- Revel Bars
- S’more Bars
Have you made this recipe?
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Peanut Butter Cup Gooey Cookie Bars
Ingredients
- 1 cup unsalted butter, melted
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup light brown sugar packed
- 2 large eggs
- 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 3/4 cup chocolate chips
- 30 Miniature Peanut Butter Cups see note
- 1 14 ounce can fat-free sweetened condensed milk
- 1/4 cup creamy peanut butter
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350°F. Line a 9×13” baking pan with foil and spray with cooking spray for easy removal.
- Stir together melted butter with both sugars. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing completely. Mix in vanilla extract, salt, and baking soda. Mix flour in slowly. Stir in chocolate chips.
- Pour the sweetened condensed milk into a small bowl and add the peanut butter. Stir until smooth.
- Press half the cookie dough in the prepared pan. (Spray your hands with nonstick cooking spray so it won’t stick to you.) Top the dough with peanut butter cups.
- Pour sweetened condensed milk mixture over the top of the bottom layer (be careful to leave about 1/4” edge around the pan so the milk doesn’t touch the foil), then break up the remaining cookie dough and place on top of milk. Press with your hands to flatten. It will mostly cover but not completely cover the bottom layer.
- Bake for about 30-35 minutes until the tops of the bars just start to get golden brown. Cool completely before slicing into bars.
- Store in an airtight container for up to 3 days or freeze for up to one month. These are best served room temperature.
Recipe Video
Recipe Notes
- Use 1 (4 ounce) bag minis (the bite size ones that come unwrapped) OR
- About 30 miniatures that you unwrap and chop
Recipe Nutrition
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Peanut Butter Gooey Bars are the BEST chocolate chip cookie bar filled with peanut butter sweetened condensed milk and peanut butter cups. This is an EPIC easy dessert gooey bar everyone loves!
How come I was never invited to a party like that?! Hey, these cookies look soooooo good!
I’m almost 100% sure that if I searched for cookie cutters like that on Amazon that would be the only add I’d ever see anywhere online. How did you dodge that? ?
All you really had to say was “goey bars” to get me interested in these. They look so thick and chewy. I’m hungry now.
I never saw it once, which I thought was weird. It must have some sort of tracker so that it doesn’t do that – thank goodness!
It sounds like this was QUITE the 40th bday party! I hope your cookies were a huge success 🙂
And these bars…gooey bar meets peanut butter cups. Amazing. And since Mel hardly eats any of your desserts, I don’t know what you do with them all! If my family didn’t eat 99% of what I made, I’d be in trouble. And I STILL have tons of people I donate stuff to!
You’re making THOSE cookies, huh? Well, if the blogging thing ever gets boring, you can have another career as an adult cookie maker. I’m sure it’s a huge industry somewhere!
These are pretty much the only thing you could have done to the original gooey bars to make them better. Peanut butter cups are the best addition ever.
That party sounds fun – good luck piping without having anybody see what you’re doing!
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