No Bake Peanut Butter Balls without Chocolate

These old fashioned peanut butter balls are no bake, made with just 4 ingredients, and without the hassle of dipping them in chocolate!

If you’re craving a treat with a scrumptious peanut butter flavor, these are just the ticket!

While these 4 ingredient peanut butter balls are great served around Christmas and the holiday season, they’d be the perfect summer dessert as well since this is a no bake recipe.

BTW, if you’re looking for the chocolate-covered peanut butter balls version of these, make sure to check out my Buckeye Recipe!

Video Tutorial:

Here’s a quick video tutorial in case you learn better by watching. The full written tutorial and printable recipe are below!

Ingredients:

Here are the 4 simple ingredients you’ll need:

• 1 cup smooth peanut butter: This isn’t the time to use natural peanut butter or chunky peanut butter. You want a nice, creamy peanut butter. I like the Good and Gather organic no-stir peanut butter. Please note that even though it’s no-stir it’s still more drippy than something like Jif or Skippy.
• 1/2 cup softened butter: You want the butter to be softened to room temperature so it’s easier to mix with the peanut butter. However, if your butter is super soft, the dough will be harder to work with. BTW I use salted butter, so if you use unsalted butter you may want to add a pinch of salt.
• 2 cups powdered sugar: This is what stiffens the dough so you can roll it. I’ve experimented with less powdered sugar, and it results in peanut butter balls that are too soft. But I’ll discuss another way to make a less-sweet version at the end of this post.
• 3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract: This is optional, but I really like the flavor that pure vanilla extract adds.

 

How to Make No Bake Peanut Butter Balls without Chocolate:

Place the peanut butter and butter in a medium bowl. Beat with a hand mixer until smooth.

Sift the powdered sugar on top of the peanut butter mixture. Beat until smooth.

Add the vanilla extract and beat until smooth.

After you add the vanilla, you may find that you need to add a few more tablespoons of powdered sugar in order to achieve the proper consistency.

It’s okay if the dough isn’t completely dry since you’ll be chilling the peanut butter balls, but it needs to be dry enough to roll into balls.

Forming the Peanut Butter Balls:

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. You could also use wax paper if that’s what you have on hand.

You can also use two 13×9-inch pans instead, or just immediately put them into storage containers.

Now, the size you make the balls is up to you.

I like to use a rounded teaspoon of dough, but you can do more or less.

You could also use a small cookie scoop or ice cream scoop to portion out the dough.

Roll the dough into smooth balls and place them on the prepared baking sheet.

If the dough starts to stick to your hands, you can either chill it for a bit or dip your hands in powdered sugar.

 

Chilling the Dough:

Once all of the dough is rolled out, transfer the baking sheet to the freezer until the peanut butter balls are firm, about 20 minutes.

You can skip this step if you aren’t planning on eating them right away.

As mentioned above, if you don’t plan on eating them immediately after making them, you can place them in an airtight container right away.

You’ll need to chill them in the refrigerator for a couple of hours before they’re firm enough to serve.

This recipe makes about 48-50 balls, but feel free to make a double batch if you want to serve a crowd! Or cut the recipe in half if you only want a few on hand.

Storing:

If you store these in an airtight container in the refrigerator, they will last for at least a week.

For longer-term storage, you can place them in a freezer safe container and store in the freezer for a month or two.

Variations:

• For a higher protein, less sweet version, reduce the powdered sugar to 1 ½ cups and add ¾ cup of collagen peptides. You might need to chill the dough before rolling.
• As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, if you want to make these dipped with melted chocolate, check out my Buckeye Balls Recipe.
• You could experiment with adding mini chocolate chips, Rice Krispies, or even crushed graham crackers. Note that I have not personally tried those.

Why are my peanut butter balls sticky?

There a few factors that could contribute to sticky or runny peanut butter balls:

• If your peanut butter is really runny to begin with, you’ll need to add more powdered sugar to get it to dry out.
• If your butter was really soft, you may need to chill the dough a bit before rolling out the peanut butter balls.

Now if you’re finding that they’re super runny and you don’t want to add more powdered sugar, you could experiment with adding a little coconut flour, oat flour, almond flour, etc. 

Don’t use wheat flour (AKA all-purpose flour) unless you toast it first!

Can I store them at room temperature? 

These can be safely stored at room temperature for a few days, but you may find that they become too soft at room temperature. It’s totally a preference thing!

Can I use almond butter or cashew butter?

I have not personally tried these with other nut butters, but it should work as long as they’re nice and smooth and not too runny.

So that’s my easy peanut butter balls recipe! Make sure to check out my other peanut butter recipes below:

More Peanut Butter Recipes:

• Homemade Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups
• Chocolate Layer Cake with Peanut Butter Frosting
• Salted Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Soft Peanut Butter Cookies

Recipe Card: