Low Fat, High Protein Peanut Butter Cups!

      A few weeks ago, my daughter did a guest post for me about peanut butter powder.  It was a thought provoking post for me and I have come up with a lot of ideas where this product could really be useful.  The other day, I was at our local Fry's grocery store where I found Jiff Peanut Butter Powder!  I decided to give it a try because it is 85% less fat and full of protein!  It is also very accessible for the regular home shopper.
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    Back when I was in college, my friend and roommate, Debbie VanWagenen, gave me a recipe for peanut butter cups.  I have made it many times for my kids over the years, especially during the summer when I don't want to bake.  They are delicious, but also full of fat! They have a cup of butter and all of that peanut butter and not to mention the chocolate chips melted on top.  So, I decided it would be great to make them with a lot less fat and maybe we wouldn't have to feel quite so guilty about eating them as an occasional treat.  For some reason, I couldn't find Debbie's recipe in my stash! But, here is what seems like a similar one, only I added reconstituted Peanut Butter Powder instead of the regular peanut butter.
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Lower Fat Peanut Butter Cups

​2 .c. crushed graham crackers
​2 cubes butter, melted
2 c. powdered sugar
1  1/2  c. reconstituted peanut butter powder
1 bag of chocolate chips

To reconstitute the peanut butter powder, the back of the package says to mix 3 T. powder with 1  1/2 T. water, 1 tsp honey and a dash of salt.  So, that is a ratio if 2:1.  The peanut butter powder had about 2 cups of powder in it, so I mixed that with 1 cup of water, a Tablespoon of honey and about a tsp. of salt.  (The honey and salt are to taste.)  I actually ended up putting in about 1  1/4 c. water to get the consistency that I wanted.  Ha Ha, here is where I messed up! I dumped the entire amount of peanut butter into the cracker mixture. I think that was more than 1  1/2 c.  So, my peanut butter cups came out a little gooier than they might have.  But, they still tasted great!

Spread all of this mixture into a 9 x 13 pan and put it in the fridge while you melt the chocolate chips in the microwave.  Spread the chocolate on the peanut butter mixture and you are through!  Just let the chips harden a bit, then slice these babies up.

      While I realize the butter and the chocolate keep these bars from being really low in fat, the peanut butter powder does save on a lot of the fat calories.  The flavor met with my families approval!  I can hardly wait far the weather to get cooler so I can bake again and use this product in a lot of other applications I have up my sleeve!  In the meantime, enjoy these no-bake tidbits!