Peanut Butter Cereal Bars

Peanut Butter Cereal Bars are no-bake cookies that taste like your favourite peanut butter chocolate candy.

The first time I tasted these cookies I'd thought I'd never eaten anything so good.  That was over forty years ago. (I've eaten many "the best ever" foods since, ha, ha.) I had just started teaching and the home economics teacher and her class had made these.  Of course I was always willing to be a taste tester for the class.  As I like peanut butter in desserts, and these were so like Reese's Peanut Butter Cups but with a really nice crunch to them, they were a winner in my book.  Naturally, I asked for the recipe and was amazed at how easy they were to make.

Just to let you know how impressed I was with these Peanut Butter Cereal Bars, I made them for the cookie trays at my wedding.  They hold a dear and special place in my old recipe box.

The original recipe called for Special K but over the years I've also used Corn Flakes and Rice Krispies or their generic cousins with great success.  

Printable recipe at end of post.

Peanut Butter Cereal Bars

• ¾ cup white sugar
• ¾ cup corn syrup
• 2 tablespoons butter
• Pinch of salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1½ cups smooth peanut butter
• 4 cups Special K, Cornflakes, or Rice Krispies
• 1 package chocolate chips, about 1½ cups

How to make it:
Grease and line with parchment paper a 9x13-inch pan.

Place sugar, corn syrup, butter and salt in large pan and stir together. Over medium high heat bring to a slow boil for 1 minute until sugar is dissolved. Do not bring to a rolling boil and do not boil for more than 1 minute. Remove from heat, stir in vanilla and peanut butter until smooth.  Stir in the cereal. Pack cookie mixture in the prepared pan. Spread with 1 package melted chocolate chips.  Cut into squares or bars.

Makes 1 9x13-inch pan.

 Place the sugar, corn syrup, salt and butter in a large pan.

 Stir ingredients together and bring to a slow boil over medium high heat.

 Boil for 1 minute once the mixture starts to boil. 

Remove from heat as soon as mixture has boiled for 1 minute and add the peanut butter and vanilla.

 Stir in the cereal and mix to coat. As you can see I used Corn Flakes today.

 Make sure all the cereal is coated in the peanut butter mixture.

Pack the peanut butter cereal mixture into the prepared pan. 

Pour the melted chocolate chips over the cereal mixture, spreading evenly to coat.  As you can see I made half a recipe in an 8x8-inch pan because there are just the two of us to gobble up these cookies.

When the cereal mixture has cooled and the chocolate has hardened it's time to cut into bars. If you line your pan with parchment paper it is easy to remove the uncut bars from the pan. Lay them on a cutting board and slice into bars.  I cut 24 bars from this half recipe amount.

I had to try one or two of these Peanut Butter Cereal Bars to make sure they tasted as good as I told you they did.

Peanut Butter Cereal Bars sit well on a cookie plate, by themselves or mixed in with a variety of cookies.

Peanut Butter Cereal Bars make a tasty treat!

To print click on arrow upper right side.⇩