Five Ideas for a Peanut Butter Surplus

Katie Katie Parsons is the creator of Mumbling Mommy and is a freelance writer, editor and communications specialist. She works from her home office on the east coast of Florida. Most often she writes about life in a combined family of five children and what it's like being a full time work-from-home parent. Feel free to pitch guest post ideas or just drop her a line at katie@mumblingmommy.com.

I opened my pantry about two weeks ago to discover that we had eight jars of peanut butter at various states of use. Two were nearly empty, another one just opened and the seals on the others had not been cracked. It struck me as odd that we had so much peanut butter, especially since I had just sent three jars to school with my stepson for a food drive. We like Buy One Get One sales in our house; the house is also divided between extra chunky and smooth preferences. We also live in a hurricane zone, so too much peanut butter is not necessarily a bad thing. Still…

I wondered what I could do with all this peanut butter — since I had it anyway. I found a few recipes that I liked and then asked readers on Facebook for suggestions. Here are five ways to use up those peanut butter jars, and likely still have some leftover:

1. Peanut Butter Cheesecake Bars. Suggested by me, because I made them. I actually cheated a little bit, and bought a box of Jello No-Bake Cheesecake mix. I then looked up a fancy recipe on TLC for Peanut Butter Cheesecake Bars and followed the directions for the peanut butter part, substituting my easier basic cheesecake kit. I think I could have made a better graham cracker crust from scratch, but they turned out pretty tasty. Either go my route, or use the official recipe for your own. This used up one cup of my peanut butter stash.

2. Dog Treats. Suggested by Heather C. We do not have a permanent dog here, but our dog-in-laws often visit. I’m not sure if my mother-in-law would approve of this human food-based snack for her pups, but I did find some pretty cool recipes when I researched this. Like this seasonal one for peanut butter and pumpkin dog treats at A Beautiful Mess. Or one for peanut butter and banana dog treats, as recommended by the folks at Whole Foods.

3. An afternoon snack. Suggested by Maggie S. This is easy enough. Spread the peanut butter onto apple slices, or celery when afternoon hunger strikes. Or do like Maggie suggested and grab a spoon.

4. Thai-style peanut sauce. Suggested by Elizabeth. I got 1,620,000 Google results when I searched this term. The Easy Thai Peanut Sauce from SheSimmers.com stood out to me because it looks authentic and comes accompanied with pictures of food that looks delicious. She also talks about learning to cook from her mom in the post — a good read that will make you hungry too.

5. Peanut butter No-Bake cookies. Suggested by Katie N. This is another recipe that has millions of hits online. I sifted through the first ten and found a yummy version of Peanut Butter No Bakes on The Southern Plate that has over 1,000 “likes” on Facebook (so it must be good, right?). Blogger Christy Jordan says that her family goes through a large jar of peanut butter every single week. Maybe I should get her address.

True stories from the front lines of parenting.

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