An Unintentional Collection

Peanut butter is, undoubtedly, one of the greatest foodstuffs known to mankind. Without peanut butter, I’m not sure I would have survived high school. Although our cafeteria was not the worst, it got pretty awful after eating there exclusively for three or four weeks, so the diet was supplemented with a myriad of healthy and unhealthy foods. Plenty of kids ate ramen and Mountain Dew or Vault every day. One girl seemed to survive almost exclusively on avocado and tea (she was a vegan in public boarding school, poor thing). For me, it was macaroni and cheese (usually eaten after 10 PM and split between a few roommates and friends) and large spoonfuls of store brand creamy peanut butter.

Since I left high school, I have stopped eating peanut butter by the spoonful, except in extreme situations. Usually that means late-night writing sessions when I need easy energy or quick breakfasts when I forgot to set my alarm clock. But I do eat a lot of peanut butter. I eat peanut butter with tea and crackers, on English muffins, with cold noodles, on ice cream, with celery, and, of course, in peanut butter cookies. This requires a pretty steady supply of peanut butter, particularly my favorite kind: Hannaford’s store-brand creamy. I know, it’s not glamorous, but it tastes just right.Unfortunately I now have a surplus of peanut butter. In and of itself, that is not a problem. The problem is that it is mostly peanut butter I don’t like.

Figure 1. From left to right: Hannaford’s Creamy, Hannaford’s Crunchy, Peanut Butter & Co. Mighty Maple (“blended with yummy maple syrup”), Nature’s Place (Hannaford’s) All Natural Creamy, Organic Sunbutter, Teddie Old Fashioned All Natural Smooth, and Teddie All Natural Chunky with Flaxseed.

Only two of these belong to me: the Hannaford’s Creamy and the Sunbutter (which is, I feel, a healthy alternative that does not force me to compromise my peanut butter standards). I live in what you might call a two peanut butter household. My boyfriend was raised (brainwashed, I assume) to prefer the natural, sticks-in-your-mouth kind of peanut butter whose flavor I find pretty underwhelming. Ideally, this conflict is solved by simply stocking two kinds of peanut butter and in itself does not explain my current situation. Easiest to explain is the crunchy peanut butter, which belongs to a friend’s dog that I used to look after. The three natural peanut butters (for the record, we just finished a fourth jar of Teddie’s Creamy) are the result of my boyfriend’s work as an archaeologist, which leads him to spend 4-10 days at a time living out of hotel rooms. He hates bringing food into the field, so he usually comes home with a few bagels, a few bottles of beer, and a half-empty jar of peanut butter. Thus, three (four, until today) jars of natural peanut butter.
So, I need to use up some peanut butter.

My first project in this endeavor is the classic: peanut butter cookies. My family has long held that we make the best peanut butter cookies. Every peanut butter cookie I have had at a pot luck, Christmas party, or wedding not made by a member of my family inevitably disappoints. They are pale, weak imitations of the real thing...

Figure 2. Peanut butter cookies and milk.

Ingredients
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup butter, softened1 cup peanut butter (I used ½ Hannaford’s Creamy and ½ Nature’s Place Creamy)
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
2 ¼ cup flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt

Figure 3. My lovely assistant demonstrates the appropriate fork pressing technique for ideal peanut butter cookies.

Procedure
-Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
-Mix flour, baking soda, and salt in a small-medium bowl
-In a large bowl, cream together butter, brown and white sugar. Add peanut butter and beat well. Add eggs and vanilla and mix well.
-Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix until completely combined.
-Roll tablespoons of dough into balls and set on an ungreased cookie sheet. Flatten each ball with a lightly floured fork.
-Bake for 7-10 minutes, until desired coloration and crunchiness are achieved (there is some debate as to the appropriate levels of each of these, but I stand firmly in the browned-and-crunchy camp. The sugars have a chance to get a tad caramelized and the texture is just right for dipping in milk while maintaining structural integrity)