Easy Peanut Butter Buckeye Recipe with Pretzels

Making Easy Buckeye Pretzels are a quick easy treat.  If you love Reeces Peanut Butter Cups, then this Recipe is for you!  Made with Peanut Butter, Chocolate, and Pretzels it’s the perfect dessert or snack to curb your sweet tooth.

I enjoy this quick and Easy Buckeye Recipe and make it often to take to events instead of cookies.  Why?  

Well, because Buckeyes have a familiar favorite flavor and are just enough different from cookies to be eaten up quickly.  And who doesn’t love that?  I sure do!

Buckeyes are a candy treat made from a peanut butter and partially dipped in chocolate to leave a circle of peanut butter visible. 

This recipe for Buckeyes Pretzels are similar but with the added crunch of the pretzels which give a salty taste to the velvety smooth sweet peanut butter filling.  

Ingredients

The ingredient list is simple with a few pantry staples and simple ingredients.

Wet Ingredients. Peanut Butter, Butter, Vanilla Extract

Dry Ingredients. Pretzels, Powdered Sugar (confectioners’ sugar), Chocolate Chips or Melting Chocolate

How to make Pretzel Buckeyes

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.  You can also use a silicone mat or wax paper. This helps to lift the Buckeyes off when they have hardened and set.

To start, add softened butter, peanut butter and powdered sugar to a large bowl.

With a hand mixer, mix on low until combined.  Trust me here, using a higher speed will only throw powdered sugar and bits of butter and peanut butter all over your kitchen. 

Once mixture is combined, go ahead and increase the speed of the hand mixture to make a smooth.  It’s best to use softened butter.  Allow 1 hour sitting on the counter to come to room temperature and soften.

The mixture will be thick.  I like to use a small cookie scoop to ball the peanut butter mixture. 

You can also roll into balls in the palms of your hands.  But work quickly because the heat from your hands will quickly melt the mixture.

I personally like to use a small Cookie Scoop to scoop out the perfect size ball and place on a pretzel, then I squish a pretzel on top until some of the filling pokes out the holes.

Scoop creamy peanut butter mixture onto mini pretzels and top each with a pretzel making a little sandwich of sorts.  I like to line up the pretzel shapes so it’s nice and uniform too.

How to Melt Chocolate for Dipping?

Instant Pot Trick:

I’m not kidding on how simple this trick is. In your Instant Pot place 5-6 cups water and set to Saute’.

Using a larger glass bowl, place on top of your Instant Pot. This will create a double boiler. Place your chocolate pieces in the bowl and allow the water to heat up below.

As the water heats up, the chocolate will melt. Stir with a rubber or silicone spatula until smooth. Turn Instant Pot to Warm to keep melted chocolate a perfect consistency.

Dipping Process

Dip your Pretzel Buckeye Bites into chocolate and place on a lined cookie sheet to harden.  I only dip ½ of the pretzel bites into chocolate and leave the other half un-dipped.  

Peanut Butter Buckeyes will set up in about 20-30 minutes or you can chill them quickly by placing in the refrigerator for a few minutes.

Don’t these Easy Buckeye Bites look amazing?

Troubleshooting Tips:

• If peanut butter mixture is too sticky add a few tablespoons more powdered sugar.
• Chill Peanut Butter mixture in refrigerator for 20-30 minutes. 
• Use softened butter but not mushy butter. If butter is mushy it is too soft and will create a very sticky peanut butter filling.

How to Store Buckeyes Recipe

Easy Buckeye Recipe truly are easy with very little mess.  They are so fun and hardly last long enough to even harden in my home.  

But if you must store some for later, just place Buckeye Candy into an airtight container.  It’s also best to keep cool on the counter out of direct sunlight.

You can store in refrigerator but I tend to notice the pretzels go soft after a day in the fridge.  So just keep that in mind.

How to make Buckeye Peanut Butter Balls?

It doesn’t matter if you make Buckeye Balls, or this Easy Buckeye Recipe with pretzels, the ingredients for the smooth peanut butter mixture is the same.  And both are dipped ½ way into chocolate.  You can’t wrong.  

To make Buckeye Peanut Butter Balls I find it’s easiest to dip the Buckeye Balls when they have chilled with a toothpick on top.  

Chilled Peanut Butter Balls are much easier to dip. That way they are easy to dip in the warm chocolate without making a mess.  

The toothpick hole is easily filled in by smoothing out the top once the chocolate has set.

For that same reason I enjoy these Easy Buckeye Recipe because they are so easy to dip and keep your hands clean.

Types of Peanut Butter

I’ve used a creamy peanut butter in this recipe.  But feel free to use Crunchy Peanut Butter, Natural Peanut Butter, or even a Cookie Butter.

Substitutions

Chocolate. Choose a chocolate you love best.  For this reason I recommend a Semi-Sweet Chocolate chips.  It balances well with the rich creamy sweetened peanut butter mixture.  But Milk Chocolate or even a Bitter Sweet / Dark Chocolate works great too.  

You can even try a White Chocolate or Chocolate Melts or Chocolate Almond Bark.

What is a Buckeye?

Chocolate Buckeyes are a candy treat from the great state of Ohio.  The Ohio Buckeye Tree is a neatly rounded tree with beautiful deep foliage.  

The leathery husk is dark brown and covers most of the outside of the buckeye nut.  Leaving a creamy color circle on top.  

Chocolate-dipped peanut butter balls look just like a Buckeye Nut.