Dairy Free "Reese's"

                                             

Halloween and other holidays can be difficult for individuals with food allergies. You never realize how much social events revolve around food until you cannot eat food safely! 

To help your holidays and every day celebrations be inclusive for those with dairy allergies, the fan favorite Reese's peanut butter cups.

Now, you can buy a genuine, Reese's brand dairy free version at many of your favorite retailers! Here's one link. 

If you're running out of time or prefer a simple ingredient list, can you make dairy-free chocolate peanut butter cups from home? Eleven-year-old Emily seriously thought making these would be enough to get be onto Zoom cafe, but this year I wanted to try an actual recipe. 

Method

Dairy-free ingredients:

Chocolate chips (Trader Joe's)

My favorite regular peanut butter but I typically use generic 

Powdered sugar 

Recipe:

https://itdoesnttastelikechicken.com/vegan-peanut-butter-cups/#recipe

Procedures and tips: 

1. Measure out your peanut butter for the filling. Pro tip: measure peanut butter by weight, or grease your measuring cup. 

2. Add powdered sugar, vanilla, and salt. 

3. Mix and set aside. If you are using natural peanut butter you might need to refrigerate the mixture to firm it up. 

4. Melt half of the chocolate chips. I used the recommended steps for microwaving in 20 second increments, stirring in between each, and it took about 1 minute total. Tip: melt until it almost looks all melted, and stir until it is smooth. I did not add coconut oil here because I did not have any on hand. It may be especially useful for the top later, when you want it to be smooth and shiny. 

5. Put into your liners or muffin cups, and freeze. It took about 10 minutes until they were firmed up. 

6. Add peanut butter filling. I chose to freeze for an additional 10 minutes here, thinking it may be less messy to pour the chocolate on top after. 

7. Melt more chocolate as above, and pour over top. I added some sea salt to the top of a few. 

Results

This recipe yields 12 muffin-wide chocolate coated peanut butter cups. 

They need to remain frozen or refrigerated, but were delicious, crispy, and creamy in a delicious bite. 

Discussion

With more awareness of food allergies and overall sensitivity to those with dietary restrictions, it is so nice to see individuals and companies coming together to be inclusive with treats around holidays and celebrations. 

If you want to learn more about being inclusive of food allergies on Halloween, check out the Teal Pumpkin Project. These would taste great with other nut butters, seed butters, or other fillings!

These homemade versions were delicious, and I hope to try Reese's own dairy free version as well! Even though they may not taste exactly the same as the original, it can be so meaningful to have a comparable option. Thanks to my mom for realizing the value of this when I was young!