You don’t need to bury your cravings for cookies just because you are too lazy to make the arrangement for baking. Whether you don’t have much time or you don’t want to spend time measuring ingredients, preparing the batter, making cookie dough, etc. then making no-bake cookies is the ideal option to go for.
Pretty much all the no-bake cookies recipes require using peanut butter. If this is something that you don’t like, I can show you how to make no-bake cookies without peanut butter.
Why Not Peanut Butter?
Peanut butter is a name of love mostly to kids, teenagers, and a number of adults as well. However, it’s not good for all people. One of the reasons that people avoid having peanut butter is due to its allergic reaction. This triggers one of the most severe allergies. So, if you are allergic, don’t even think about it even in your dreams.
Many schools and daycares don’t allow students to bring food items that include peanut products because more than 2.8% of kids are severely allergic to peanuts. Even if your kid isn’t allergic to it, still there is a high chance that allergic kids can consume it if they are offered, whether it’s willingly and unwillingly.
So, if you are to save time preparing something real quick for your kid, peanut butter is out of the options.
Another point is that peanut fields are heavily treated with pesticides. As the peanut shells are thin, it’s most likely that some chemicals will leach through the shell.
However, having organic peanut butter is a safer and healthier option than the commercial ones if you are not allergic to it.
The amount of fat in peanut butter is quite high. You are okay to have a little bit, but too much can cause health issues unless you are on a low carb or Ketogenic diet.
Regular no bake cookies recipes require using a lot of peanut butter, which makes the cookies pretty much fat bombs.
If you care more about the consequences of health than the taste, peanut butter no bake cookies aren’t for you.
Common Ingredients for No Bake Cookies
Apart from the peanut butter, no bake cookies require butter, milk, sugar, cocoa powder, and oats to make them. You also have the option to use vanilla extract, almond extract, salt, raisins, chocolate chips, etc. to enhance the taste and flavor.
You need to mix all the ingredients together and scoop the batter into a tray. That’s all, no cooking, no baking, zero hazards.
Making such cookies is so easy due to the peanut butter as it holds the bonding of cookies nicely. But, you don’t want to use PB in your cookies, let’s find out how.
Make No Bake Cookies Without Using Peanut Butter
If you are to ditch the key ingredient of the recipe, you need to cook some ingredients in a saucepan. Boil butter, milk, sugar, cocoa powder for a few minutes until the mixture becomes thick and sugar is crystallized.
Then, drop this thick and hot batter onto a sheet pan, leave it until it becomes cool.
Yeah, it’s done. Were you expecting the recipe to take more time? Nah, your no bake cookies are ready to eat without using peanut butter.
But if you want to add more ingredients, you can add some oats to the mix to make the cookies healthier.
Add-ins
Another add-in option is to boil maple syrup, then stir in shredded coconut, and cook the mixture until it becomes thick. Place the hot batter into the sheet tray, and enjoy delicious cookies that you might probably have ever tasted.
As the cookies don’t require baking in the oven, it will only take 5 minutes to be served before you.
Dates
You can add date paste in the batter as well. To make the paste, soak the dates and make a puree out of them. Whether it’s date puree, nuts, oats, and other flavorings, you can mix and scoop together to make the cookies more delicious.
If you are to use dates, consider not adding sugar if you don’t like too much sugary taste.
Dried Fruits
No dates in the kitchen? No worries! You can still add some flavor to the cookies. You can use dried figs and other dried fruits in the same manner that I have mentioned for dates.
Due to the stickiness of dried figs, these are great for adding into no bake cookies. Dried apricots can be another great add-in to enhance the taste of the cookies. It will add a great looking bright and fruity flavor to your dessert.
Chop the apricots using a food processor, then mix the chopped ones with the batters. This will add a great tasting sweet sticky flavor.
Nutella
If you miss the peanut butter flavor, you can try adding Nutella to the cookies. Technically, it’s obviously not PB but will work as a great substitute. Nuts in the cookies make quite an appeal to those who cannot eat peanuts due to allergic issues.
For those who don’t know, Nutella is made of hazelnuts, so it’s a nut-based item. Use the same amount of Nutella as the recipe suggests for peanut butter. As Nutella has a great chocolate flavor, it will make your cookies more delicious.
However, Nutella isn’t considered as quite a healthy option for adults, still worth giving it a try occasionally.
Other Nuts
If you are okay with almond, hazelnut, and cashew nuts, you can grind them up and use it as an add-in ingredient to your no bake cookies. Be sure to make nut flour out of them; using a spice grinder will do the trick.
So, for this recipe, you will be using ground nuts, vanilla extract, and powdered sugar. Mix them well to make cookie butter.
You can also make yummy snowballs by rolling the mix into balls and powdered sugar.
Chocolate
Are you wondering whether you can use melted chocolate in no bake cookies or not? Melted chocolate can add great taste as well as flavor to your cookies, so yeah, you are good to go with this add-in too. It will make the cookie batter firm and perfect for the desert.
One thing you need to take care of while using the melted chocolate, up
be sure to stir and scoop as quickly as you can before the chocolate sets.As you would expect from the melted chocolate, it will make the cookies even more delicious to eat.
Final Words
No bake cookies are great for those who want to satisfy their cravings for cookies or carbs within the shortest possible time without doing much hassle.
Even if you are allergic to peanuts, and looking for how to make no bake cookies without peanut butter, hopefully, you have already started planning which add-in to use for the cookies. You will not miss peanut butter in your cookies any longer. And yes, don’t need to bake in the oven to make the process lengthy.