Heavenly Candy

Buckeyes: Heaven on earth.

My darling friend ST made these once and brought them to me as a gift. I was in love, looked up the recipe and never made them...

Cut to years later... and I come across them again. And a reason to make them.

I needed a little treat for us to have at our cookie swap last weekend, and this seemed perfect.

I found a recipe on a site I enjoy, If you make them, let me know what you think!!! Trust me, they're AWESOME!

Buckeyes


Yield: 36 to 42 tablespoon-sized candies
I made about 70 with a small cookie/ice cream scoop (about 1/2 oz)

1/4 cup (2 ounces) cream cheese, softened
1 1/2 cups peanut butter smooth, but you can use chunky if you are looking for more texture
1 cup graham cracker crumbs (from about 14 graham crackers)
Salt
3 cups confectioners’ (powdered) sugar
10 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks or 5 ounces) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
12 ounces dark chocolate (60 to 72%), coarsely chopped

Make the filling: In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese and peanut butter together until combined. Add the graham cracker crumbs and beat for 10 seconds. Add the sugar and butter, and mix on the lowest speed until it stops floating off everywhere, then increase the speed until the ingredients are combined.

Scrape down the whole bowl well, then mix again. The mixture will be quite sturdy and a little dry — perfect for shaping. Set it aside while you prepare the coating (made the balls before the melting began since I melted in the microwave).

Make the coating: Melt the chocolate either over a double boiler, stirring until it is completely smooth or in a microwave in 30 then 10 second increments, stirring before you start it again until it is completely smooth (Careful to NOT burn the chocolate in the microwave). Let it cool to tepid while you shape the peanut butter centers (like I said, I made the balls first since I used the microwave to melt the chocolate).

Assemble the candies: Line a sheet pan with parchment (or wax) paper. Scoop out slightly more than one tablespoon’s worth of filling (their suggestion; I used a scoop that made them a little smaller) and use your hands to roll into a ball. Place the ball on the prepared sheet and repeat the process until all of the candies have been shaped. They can sit close to each other but make sure they are not touching.

Using a fork or large skewer (or you can try a tooth pick), dip each ball into the chocolate and roll it about so that almost the entire candy is coating, leaving a small circle uncoated (leaving it a bit uncovered is what makes it a buckeye). Play around with a few practice pieces. But don’t fuss too much; even the “ugly” ones won’t go to waste.

I found it was a little difficult to keep the stick in the ball, do your best! They're all edible!

Chill the buckeyes until they are set, about 30 minutes.

I put them in a tupperware with wax paper between layers and stored it in the freezer; it will keep a while in the freezer, plus you wont be TOO tempted to eat them all if they're frozen!