There are some foods that just resonate nostalgia and bring about wonderful memories from the past. And for us, Reese’s Peanut Butter Christmas Trees do just that. When we were kids, these sweet treats were ones that we frequently found in our stockings on Christmas morning. And now the tradition is carried on for our children.
In this post we’ll show you how to make them homemade. And if you’re a visual person, you’ve probably analyzed the shape of the Reese’s store-bought Christmas trees and have thought there is room for improvement. One benefit of making them yourself is providing that improvement on the shape of the tree and the flavor.
Chocolate Covered Peanut Butter Christmas Trees
The recipe for making Reese’s chocolate covered peanut butter Christmas trees is quite straightforward and involves typical pantry ingredients that you likely will already have in supply.
There are a couple of possibilities as to how the trees can be shaped. The first is by using a Christmas tree shaped cookie cutter. And the second is by using silicon Christmas tree molds. We chose to use the cookie cutter method, but you can choose whatever method you prefer.
Peanut Butter Chocolate Trees | Copycat Reese’s Trees
The main benefit of making these trees is that they don’t involve any baking. You’ll want to plan ahead to allow the proper time to make them though, because for best results you’ll want to allow time for chilling.
Reese’s Peanut Butter Christmas Trees are made mainly with a delicious peanut butter mixture and then involves dipping the shaped peanut butter in melted chocolate. Because peanut butter becomes gooey when it’s handled, this recipe works best to include three chilling phases. The first is after the mixture has been pressed into the pan, and the second is after the shapes have been cut. The third is after the trees have been dipped in chocolate.
Handmade Gift Giving
There’s nothing more personalized and made with love than handmade gift giving. Reese’s Peanut Butter Christmas Trees are perfect for the occasion. Just wrap them in plastic wrap and tie them with a ribbon.
They can be used as hostess gifts, handmade stocking gifts, gifts for your neighbors and party favors. They have unlimited potential.
Copycat Reese’s Tree Ingredients
Here are the ingredients you’ll need to make about 12 Reese’s Peanut Butter Christmas Trees:
1 cup creamy peanut butter
¼ cup unsalted melted butter
2 tablespoons brown sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract ¼ teaspoon salt
2 cups powdered sugar
12 oz chocolate chips
How To Make Reese’s Peanut Butter Christmas Trees
These chocolate covered peanut butter Christmas trees are so delicious! And as far as appearance is concerned, well, you can have them look more like a Christmas tree than how the store-bought Reese’s ones look. Here’s how to make them:
Instructions:
1. Line an 8×8” baking pan with parchment or wax paper leaving enough room around the edge to grab and lift the paper.
2. In a mixing bowl, mix peanut butter, butter, brown sugar, vanilla and salt. Mix thoroughly until the brown sugar is dissolved. Add powdered sugar and mix.
3. Press mixture into the parchment lined baking dish, smoothing the top by flattening with the palm of your hand. The flattened mixture should be about ½ inch thick.
4. Cool in the freezer for about 1 hour, or until firm.
5. Use a Christmas tree cookie cutter to cut out trees and place them on a tray. Place back in the freezer for about 1 hour, until firm.
6. Melt the chocolate in a double boiler pan and dip the trees one by one using a fork. Place on parchment paper to cool. Cool fully in the refrigerator.
Tips for Freezer Friendly Peanut Butter Chocolate Trees
1. Make sure you don’t skip the 3 chilling times. Peanut butter can get gooey when it’s handled and chilling it will help prevent it from becoming misshapen.
2. Use thin layers of chocolate. We recommend using a double boiler pan to melt the chocolate because it makes it smooth. Dip the chocolate in thin layers for the best results. You can always dip it more than once if desired.
3. Use silicone molds if you don’t have a cookie cutter. The silicone allows the pan to be bent and the peanut butter tree to be removed more readily than a stiff pan.
4. Tap the tree to allow the excess chocolate to run off. This will help prevent large puddles from forming and your tree from being improperly shaped when it cools.
Reese’s Eggs vs. Pumpkins vs. Trees
If you’re a nostalgic person, you’ll likely know that Reese’s makes shaped chocolate covered peanut butter candies for 3 occasions.
They make egg shaped chocolate covered peanut butter in the spring. These are packaged and promoted for Easter.
Pumpkins come out in the fall and are packaged for Halloween.
And the highlight and focus here is the Christmas tree shaped chocolate covered peanut butter candy, which is packaged and promoted for the Christmas season.
Reese’s Chocolate Candy Christmas Trees
We hope that you enjoy making these Reese’s Chocolate Candy Christmas Trees. They are a great project to make together as a family or with children, and then give them as gifts or use them at your holiday parties.
How Are These Different From Reese’s Chocolate Covered Peanut Butter Christmas Trees?
These homemade copycat chocolate covered peanut butter Christmas trees are different from the Reese’s store bought version in a few ways. First, they are custom made, so the shape and visual aspects can be more realistic.
Also, the flavor is a bit different. We think ours is better flavored as has a fresher aspect. It hasn’t been sitting on a store shelf for week or months at a time. You’ll notice the difference if you’re taking the time to compare. And you’ll be pleased.
What Kind of Silicone Mold Can I Use For The Trees?
Any silicone mold can be used to make these trees. They can be found in season in many department stores or be ordered online from big box stores.
And you’re not held to a Christmas tree shape. If you prefer to make stars, gingerbread men, or any other festive shape, feel free to be creative.
What Can I Do With The Leftover Melted Chocolate?
It’s highly likely that you’ll have leftover melted chocolate and need to put it to good use. Consider dipping items from your pantry such as hard pretzels, Oreos, almonds, walnuts, chips or anything else that pairs well with chocolate.
How To Store Reese’s Peanut Butter Christmas Trees
Your chocolate covered peanut butter Christmas Trees can be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to three days or in the freezer for up to three months.
Recommended Tools For Making Chocolate Covered Peanut Butter Christmas Trees
Parchment paper or waxed paper
Cookie Cutter or silicone molds
Baking trays
Double boiler pan
Fork
Recipe Variation: Peanut Butter Cup Christmas Trees
If cutting, shaping and dipping peanut butter Christmas Trees is not your cup of tea, you might also consider making Christmas trees from already made Reese’s peanut butter cups. These are great for young children to make and still provide the same delicious chocolate covered peanut butter flavors.
To make these, you’ll need:
Frosting (to be used as glue and decorations)
Reese’s mini peanut butter cups
Regular peanut butter cups
Hershey’s kisses
Desired decorations such as sprinkles, stars, pearls
Peanut Butter Cup Christmas Trees
Peanut butter cup Christmas trees can be made and decorated wrapped or unwrapped. You choose your preference.
Trees made with unwrapped chocolates can be used as table decorations or wrapped in clear plastic and tied with a bow for gift giving.
Christmas trees made with wrapped peanut butter cups are perfect for decorating or to give as they are. The wrapping helps protect them to be enjoyed later.
Did You Know That Reese’s Come In Lots of Sizes?
If you look closely in the grocery store, you will find that there are several sizes and packaging options for your peanut butter cups. Peanut butter cups come in King size, regular size, mini size, and thins.
What Decorations Should I Use?
Any cookie or cake decorating items are perfect for decorating your peanut butter cup trees. Items such as sprinkles, stars, dragees and pearls make the perfect mini Christmas Tree ornaments and glitter.
What Icing Should I Use?
You can use Royal icing, which can be made for scratch or purchased in a tube in most grocery stores in the baking aisle. This kind of icing makes a particularly good bond when use to “glue” the peanut butter cups together.
You can also use homemade frosting such as a buttercream. This will allow you to mix it yourself and use a greater variety in colors.
Tips For Making Trees
1. Refrigerate peanut butter cups before you begin. Then allow them to return to room temperature before you begin to assemble them. This will allow the frosting to better stick to them.
2. You can add the frosting garland before or after gluing them together. Whatever seems easier for your assembly is fine. I personally prefer to glue the peanut butter cups together and then add the garland, but it can be done either way.
3. If you’re using homemade frosting or frosting that doesn’t come in a tube, you’ll want to consider use a piping bag or improvise with a plastic storage bag and cut a small portion of the corner out to create a tip.
Items You May Want For These Trees
Tube of prepared royal icing
Different sizes of peanut butter cups – we used 1 regular size, 2 miniatures, and 1. Hershey kiss
Tree decorations, sprinkles and pearls
Plastic wrap and ribbon for packaging and distributing
Peanut Butter Cup Christmas Trees Recipe
The great thing about making the peanut butter cup Christmas trees is that you don’t need a recipe. There is no mixing, baking or cooking. You just purchase the pieces and items that you want to use and then assemble them.
Keto Peanut Butter Trees
This includes a recipe variation for the chocolate covered peanut butter shaped Christmas trees. If you’re someone who requires a Keto diet, this recipe is perfect for you. It includes about 3 net carbs and tastes close to real thing.
Here’s the recipe: 1 cup peanut butter with no added sugar, ½ cup unsalted melted butter, ¾ cup powdered erythritol, 2. Tsp vanilla, ¼ tsp salt, 3 tbsp almond flour. Chocolate coating: 4 oz lily’s chocolate chips, 1-2 tbsp cacao butter. Follow the instructions in our recipe card below for the regular recipe to make your Keto Peanut Butter Trees using these ingredients.
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Christmas Coffee Cake
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Amazing Oreo Gingerbread House
Our Other Favorite Peanut Butter and Chocolate Recipes
Peanut Butter Carrots
How To Melt Peanut Butter
Hershey’s Sundae Pie
Edward’s Chocolate Pie
Don’t Forget To Give These Chocolate Covered Treats A Try Too!
Chocolate Covered Walnuts
Chocolate Covered Cranberries
Chocolate Covered Gummy Bears
Chocolate Covered Mangoes
Other Cute and Easy Cookie Ideas
Chick-fil-A Chocolate Chip Cookie
Peanut Butter Cookie
Starbucks Oatmeal Cookie
Panera Lemon Drop Cookie
Reese’s Peanut Butter Christmas Trees
Equipment
- 8×8 pan
- parchment paper
- double boiler pan
Ingredients
- 1 cup creamy peanut butter
- ¼ cup unsalted melted butter
- 2 tbsp brown sugar
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- ¼ tsp salt
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- 12 oz chocolate chips
Instructions
Peanut Butter Tree
- Line an 8×8” baking pan with parchment or wax paper leaving enough room around the edge to grab and lift the paper.
- In a mixing bowl, mix peanut butter, butter, brown sugar, vanilla and salt. Mix thoroughly until the brown sugar is dissolved. Add powdered sugar and mix.
- Press mixture into the parchment lined baking dish, smoothing the top by flattening with the palm of your hand. The flattened mixture should be about ½ inch thick.
- Cool in the freezer for about 1 hour, or until firm.
- Use a Christmas tree cookie cutter to cut out trees and place them on a tray. Place back in the freezer for about 1 hour, until firm.
Chocolate
- Melt the chocolate in a double boiler pan and dip the trees one by one using a fork. Place on parchment paper to cool. Cool fully in the refrigerator.
- Store in the freezer for long-term storage.
Save to Pinterest!
Reese’s Trees Still Look Like Something a Dog Leaves Under a Tree The Company is Embracing It
Recently on social media, people started posting about how Reese’s Peanut Butter Christmas Trees didn’t look like trees at all. They were making fun of them saying the shape was deformed. Reese’s did a good job of responding to and embracing the opportunity to leverage an advertising campaign for the peanut butter trees.
Reese’s Responds to Peanut Butter Christmas Tree Outrage With Clever Response
Reese’s has apologized and started the campaign that all trees are beautiful. They say the tree’s shape or size is not what’s important. The important thing is that they taste good.
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Reese’s Christmas Trees is a recipe I came up with to replicate the real thing.
How do you freeze these Copycat Reese’s Christmas trees? Lorraine
Hi Lorraine,
After dipping, we placed them on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Then placed them in the freezer for about 30 minutes on the cookie sheet until the chocolate was set. Once set, you can move to an airtight container that is freezer safe. This could be a zipped freezer bag or a plastic container with a lid. Have fun making and eating them!