Food Bank Recipes: Peanut Butter

For our second Tasty Tuesday, the ever-present staple, peanut butter, seems obvious. As mentioned in our first recipe post we’ll offer easy meals using ingredients you can typically find in a food hamper. We’ll also try to include plenty of one-pot recipes that can be prepared on a stove top, or even on a hot plate. This week, here’s one savoury and one sweet, simple, peanut butter-based recipe. As always, your suggestions or feedback are always welcomed in the comments, and if you know someone who might like this post, please feel free to share!

Easy Spicy Peanut Sauce

A peanut sauce is very versatile. Use it as a dip for chicken or dumplings, as a sauce for rice noodles or stir fry, drizzle it on rice, marinade chicken or shrimp in it,or thin it out for a salad dressing.

In a blender or pot, blend
2 cups of creamy peanut butter

The juice of four limes (or 1/4 cup bottled lime juice, or rice vinegar)

1 teaspoon of chili flakes or hot sauce (or garlic power for a milder sauce)

½ cup of brown sugar or honey (white sugar will work too)

½ cup of soy sauce (or teriyaki sauce).

Warming the peanut butter will make it easier to mix if using a pot. Adjust ingredient to taste. Serve warm or cold.

The Easiest Peanut Butter Cookies Ever

This recipe is found on the back of Kraft smooth peanut butter labels. Only 3 ingredients, and even I can make them (which, for this culinary-challenged writer, is saying a lot). This is also a kid friendly recipe for teaching children basic cooking skills like measuring and mixing.

1 cup Smooth Peanut Butter

1/2 cup sugar

1 egg

Mix all ingredients with large spoon until well blended.

Roll into 24 balls (if the dough is too sticky to roll, pop it into the fridge or freezer for 10 minutes or so to firm it up); place balls 4 inches apart, on baking sheets. Dip fork into water (to stop the dough from sticking to it), flatten balls with fork.

Bake 20 min. or until lightly browned (do not overbake.) Cool 5 min. on baking sheets; transfer to wire racks. Cool completely (I never wait for this…warm cookies are my weakness).