It’s no secret that I’m a huge fan of peanut butter treats. I also tend to avoid a lot of the store-bought snacks, because they’re usually full of various ingredients I don’t want to be eating, so I end up making a lot of them myself. From time to time, though, I try out something new, or at least new to me.
In this case, I somehow had never seen the Little Debbie Peanut Butter Creme Pie before. I don’t know if our local stores just didn’t carry it, or I just never looked in the right place, but apparently they’ve been around for ten years and I missed them. So of course I tried them!
The verdict: they’re fine, good even, but as I expected, full of ingredients I don’t like to eat. The fact that a single cookie is over 400 calories and has 160mg of potassium certainly doesn’t help. So, I decided to replicate the snack.
There’s really only two parts to it, of course: the cookie and the icing. The cookies are a little more complicated than my usual fast-and-easy peanut butter cookies, but they’re super tasty and stay really soft. The icing, meanwhile, is exactly as quick and easy as I expected.
Want to know how to make them for yourself? Of course you do! Fortunately, it’s easy to throw together.
Copycat Snacks: Little Debbie Peanut Butter Creme Pies
Equipment
- Baking Sheets
- Parchment Paper
- Stand Mixer
- Mixing Bowl
- Whisk
- Cookie Scoop
- Piping Bag
- Cooling Racks
Ingredients
For the Cookies
- 1 Cup Creamy Peanut Butter
- ½ Cup Unsalted Butter
- 1 Cup Brown Sugar
- ½ Cup White Sugar
- 2 Eggs
- 1 Tsp Vanilla Extract
- 1½ Cups Flour
- ½ Tsp Baking Powder
- ½ Tsp Baking Soda
For the Filling
- ¼ Cup Butter Softened
- ⅓ Cup Creamy Peanut Butter
- 1½ Cups Powdered Sugar
- 1 Tsp Vanilla Extract
- 2 Tbsp Milk
Instructions
Make the Cookies
- Preheat your oven to 350℉ and line your baking sheets with parchment paper.
- In your stand mixer, cream together the peanut butter and regular butter until smooth.
- Add in the sugars and mix until light and fluffy.
- Add the eggs and vanilla, mixing to combine.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and baking soda. Add this mixture to the peanut butter mixture and combine; this shouldn't take more than a few seconds on low, it goes quick. Fortunately, you don't need to worry about over-mixing.
- Using a spoon or cookie scoop, take about 1 Tbsp scoops of cookie dough. Lightly roll these (they're soft) into balls and place them about three inches apart on the baking sheet. Using a fork, lightly press them flatter in the usual peanut butter cookie cross pattern. Leave room between cookies; they WILL spread as they bake. You should have enough for around 30 cookies, depending on the size; try to keep it an even number for assembly.
- Bake each batch for 11-12 minutes. The edges will start to turn golden and they will continue to flatten as they cool. Let them cool for around 5 minutes before moving them to a cooling rack to finish cooling.
Make the Filling
- Clean and dry your mixer. Then, beat together the butter and peanut butter until smooth.
- Add the vanilla and powdered sugar, as well as half your milk. Beat on low until it starts to come together.
- If the icing doesn't become smooth and creamy, gradually add more milk until it does.
- To assemble the cookies, transfer the icing to a piping bag, or carefully spoon dollops of it onto half the cookies, pressing another cookie on top to assemble.
- Ideally, let the cookies sit for an hour so the icing sets a bit.
they are too soft to roll in a ball
Hi Linda! If the dough mixture is too soft you can chill it for a few minutes to firm it up a bit, though not too much. The dough is VERY soft and needs to be handled lightly to shape them.
thanks I did that and they are perfect!!!!
delicious!!! better than the store bought! thank you!
Are these ok to store in an airtight container on counter?
I don’t see a problem with it. I usually keep my cookies in a zipper lock bag on the counter and they do fine.
I bought the Little Debbie ones and have to cut them in four or feel guilty eating them. Do you have the nutritional information on these before I make them?
Unfortunately, I don’t have the ability to calculate that information; it’s a paid feature for my recipe plugin and this site doesn’t make me money to cover it. I suspect it’s similar to the brand-name cookies, just without all the artificial ingredients.
One thing you can do, instead of cutting cookies apart, would be to make them much smaller. You could divide up the dough into smaller bite-sized bits to bake (adjusting cooking time lower by a minute or so to compensate), and use just a dab of filling for each.