Easter Egg Peanut Butter Candies

Everyone’s favorite dessert flavor combination comes together in these easy no-bake chocolate peanut butter Easter egg candies! They’re like a homemade version of the popular Reese’s Peanut Butter Eggs, only a bit softer and sweeter, which makes the crisp, coarse salt on top a wonderful addition.

If you enjoy candy this time of year, these easy Buttercream Egg Candies are another egg-cellent choice. (Ha! Couldn’t resist.)

In 2015, I authored a cookbook all about making from-scratch candy and it includes some of my favorite recipes like classic chocolate fudge and caramel turtles. But the homemade peanut butter cups are certainly the crowd favorite, and I used a similar filling to create today’s peanut butter egg candies.

Tell Me About These Peanut Butter Eggs:

• Flavor: Indulge in peanut butter and chocolate bliss with every single bite of these egg-shaped candies. These homemade peanut butter eggs are certainly a special treat because they’re rich, sugary, and will satisfy your sweet cravings. You can coat the candies with dark, milk, or white chocolates. In today’s batch, I used a combination of dark and white chocolate to create a milk chocolate-like coating.
• Texture: The peanut butter filling is smooth, creamy, and thick. Dark bittersweet chocolate isn’t as soft as milk or white chocolates, so if you want a texture contrast to the creamy peanut butter filling, dark is the best candy coating choice.
• Ease: Homemade candy has the reputation of being finicky and complicated, but you don’t need a sugar PhD (LOL) or a fancy candy thermometer to make these. A beginner can easily master this recipe by following my detailed instructions below. These are EASY!

There are plenty of homemade peanut butter egg candy recipes online and I’m sure they are all wonderful! I really like this one because the filling is super creamy, but still holds its shape well.

Have you ever made peanut butter balls before? This recipe is similar, only I reduced the butter and confectioners’ sugar so the peanut butter flavor comes through even more. The full printable recipe is below, but let’s walk through some particulars so you’re all set for sweet tooth success.

Just 7 Ingredients in These Peanut Butter Easter Egg Candies

1. Softened Butter: Like most baking recipes, start with room temperature butter. Overly soft or melted butter will sabotage your efforts from the start. Good rule of thumb: let the butter sit out on the counter for 1 hour before beginning the recipe. You can use salted or unsalted butter; if using salted, no need to adjust the added salt in the recipe—I promise these are plenty sweet either way.
2. Creamy Peanut Butter: As you can guess, peanut butter is the main ingredient. For the best texture, use processed creamy peanut butter such as Jif or Skippy, the same kind I recommend for peanut butter blossoms and peanut butter frosting. Natural-style peanut butter is wonderful for eating and cooking, but I do not recommend it for this recipe because the filling will be too dry and crumbly.
3. Confectioners’ Sugar: Confectioners’ sugar binds everything together and adds sweetness. Without this powdery sugar, the peanut butter filling would be too liquid.
4. Vanilla Extract: For a little extra flavor, use vanilla extract.
5. Salt: Salt offsets the sweetness.
6. Chocolate: Just as if you were making chocolate truffles, use pure baking chocolate. Do not use chocolate chips because they do not melt properly. I list all of my advice about the chocolate coating below.
7. 1 Teaspoon Vegetable Oil: Melted chocolate can be a little too thick to smoothly coat the candies, so add a small splash of vegetable oil to help thin it out.

Optional: Sprinkle a little coarse sea salt on top of the chocolate before it sets. Or you can top the candies with festive sprinkles instead.

How to Make Peanut Butter Egg Candies

You’re essentially making a very thick peanut butter filling and molding it into flat egg-like shapes. Each Easter egg candy is 1.5 Tablespoons (about 1 ounce, or 29 grams) of filling. For consistency and ease, I recommend using a medium cookie scoop or digital scale to measure the filling for each. First, roll the filling into a ball. Flatten it between your palms so it’s about 3/4 inch thick, and then use your fingers to narrow one end to make an egg shape. It’s easier than you think, and they certainly don’t need to be perfect!

If you’re having difficulty shaping the peanut butter eggs, here are some troubleshooting tips. If your filling is:

• Too Soft: If your butter was too soft or if the peanut butter you’re using is too thin, the filling can get a little soft and sticky. The refrigerator can fix that—stop what you’re doing and chill the bowl of filling for 15 minutes in the refrigerator before trying again.
• Too Crumbly: If the filling gets a little crumbly, keeping molding it and mashing it between your hands. The warmth of your hands can help bring it back together.

This Step Makes or Breaks Your Recipe—Literally

The most important part of this homemade Easter candy recipe is chilling the shaped eggs. When making buttercream egg candies, you must chill the buttercream mixture before shaping it because it’s too soft and unworkable. For these peanut butter eggs, however, you can shape the filling right after making it.

Chill the shaped peanut butter eggs in the refrigerator to set their shape. The colder the shaped eggs, the easier time you’ll have coating them.

If you skip chilling, the egg candies will completely fall apart when you try to coat them. Trust me, I’ve made these and plenty of other similar candies before, and you will absolutely lose your mind trying to coat them if they’re room temperature or warm.

How to Coat Peanut Butter Eggs With Chocolate

1. Use real chocolate. For the BEST looking and tasting candies, start with real chocolate. Use the 4-ounce “baking chocolate” bars you can find in the baking aisle of the grocery store. I prefer Bakers or Ghirardelli brands. You need 3 4-ounce bars for this recipe, or 12 ounces total. Melting wafers also work, and for those, I recommend Ghirardelli. You can use milk, semi-sweet, dark, or even white chocolates. Be warned that using all white chocolate will produce a VERY sweet candy. Instead, I recommend dark or milk chocolates. I didn’t have any milk chocolate when I photographed these, so I mixed 8 ounces dark and 4 ounces white chocolate together. Candy melts would work, but they don’t taste like real chocolate, so I don’t recommend them. Do not use chocolate chips.
2. Melt the chocolate. You can use a double boiler or the microwave. Microwave in 20-second increments, stirring after each. Chocolate is temperamental, so always melt with care. I do not recommend tempering the chocolate for this recipe. Tempered chocolate should not be refrigerated, and due to the fresh ingredients in the filling, these candies must be refrigerated.
3. Let the chocolate cool down for a few minutes. Otherwise it will melt the cold filling.
4. Dip the peanut butter eggs. While I prefer special dipping tools for round truffles, a fork and toothpick work perfectly for these flatter candies. Submerge the peanut butter eggs into the chocolate and then carefully lift out with a fork. Tap the fork on the edge of the bowl to drip off excess chocolate. Use a toothpick to help slide the candy off the fork.
5. Allow the chocolate to set. Place the chocolate-covered eggs on a lined baking sheet. If you have leftover chocolate, drizzle it on top of the eggs—you can use a spoon or squeeze bottle for that. Place the baking sheet in the refrigerator to set the chocolate.

I repeat: Do not use chocolate chips. They’re great for chocolate chip cookies, but since they contain stabilizers, they do not melt into the correct coating consistency.

Troubleshoot: Dipping in Chocolate

Your peanut butter Easter egg candy is perfectly shaped and cold, but dipping them into chocolate is giving you some problems. Let’s work through them together.

• Chocolate is hardening before I’m finished: This is an easy fix! First, make sure you are working quickly. Second, keep the chocolate fluid by reheating in the microwave for 10 seconds or use a double boiler. If you don’t have a double boiler, spoon the chocolate into a glass bowl set over a pot of simmering water. This keeps the chocolate slightly warm. Don’t let the water touch the bottom of the glass bowl.
• Chocolate is too thick: 1 teaspoon of vegetable oil thins out the chocolate so it’s the best consistency for dipping. If you find your chocolate is still too thick, add a little more vegetable oil. Coconut oil works too, but I prefer vegetable oil.
• Chocolate isn’t smooth on the candies: It was likely too thick. You want a very thin chocolate. See above.
• Filling is melting when dipping: The chocolate is too hot. Let it sit for a few minutes to slightly cool down and then try again.
• Uncoated candies are losing their shape: If the eggs are softening and losing their shape as you’re dipping them, put the baking sheet back in the fridge for 5–10 minutes and then try again.

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