Trail Mix Peanut Butter Cookies – I love trail mix, and I love it even more when it’s baked into my favorite peanut butter cookies. The cookies are naturally gluten-free and have NO butter, flour, and I didn’t add any white sugar. They’re guaranteed to disappear!
I love trail mix so much. It’s dangerous for me to even keep it around.
One handful turns into five, which very quickly turns into the whole bag. You too?
After recently baking caramel corn into Caramel Corn Chocolate Chip Cookies, I decided to bake in trail mix. I loaded up favorite Peanut Butter Cookie recipe with my favorite trail mix add-ins.
The result is a chewy, dense, hearty cookie that’s loaded to the max with texture.
Interestingly, this cookie dough base contains NO flour, NO butter, and I didn’t add any white sugar.
I doctored up the rich peanut butter dough with 1/3 cup each of: oats, raisins, chocolate chips, and peanut butter-filled M&Ms.
If you have a bag of actual trail mix, adding 1 generous cup of that will save you from piecing together one-third cup of this and that. However, this is a great recipe for using up bottom-of-the-bags of chips, pretzels, random baking chips, and various odds and ends that plague my cupboards.
Work in your favorite trail mix goodies such as crumbled pretzels, dried fruit like craisins or apricots; butterscotch or white chocolate chips rather than semi-sweet. Add mini Rolos, peanut butter cups, or any diced candy bar. I don’t like nuts in cookies but if you do, sprinkle in some peanuts, almonds, or another favorite. Add sunflower seeds or pepitas. Mix-and-match.
When mixing the dough, make sure to cream the peanut butter, brown sugar, egg, and vanilla for at least 5 minutes, or until it’s no longer gritty. The dough will likely be oily, and this is okay. It’s important to use storebought, conventional peanut butter like Jif or Skippy. Don’t use natural peanut butter and don’t use Homemade Peanut Butter. Your cookies will be prone to spreading if you do.
Add the baking soda, oats, and add-ins. The dough is jam-packed with goodies. Almost as many add-ins as there is dough. No complaints from me.
Form 16 mounds of cookie dough with a medium 2-inch cookie scoop or make balls with your hands. It’s important to compact the mounds so the add-ins don’t slip out because the dough is oily. Just push them back in and squeeze the mounds firmly if the add-ins try to wiggle out.
After the mounds are formed, flatten them slightly and refrigerate the dough for at least two hours, up to five days, before baking. Cookies baked with unchilled dough will spread and bake flat and thin rather than thick and puffy.
The advantage to forming the dough into mounds and refrigerating them is that you have the option of only baking off as many as you want. Sometimes I just want a few cookies, not a whole batch. That said, this is a small-batch recipe, making only about 16 cookies total so feel free to bake them all at once. They stay soft for up to one week.
The cookies are supremely texture-filled from the firm chocolate chips, chewy raisins, hearty sprinkling of oats, and M&Ms. They’re like having a handful of trail mix and a peanut butter cookie, all in one.
They’re peanut butter flavor is present and distinct, but the oats and other add-ins temper it a bit. If you’re looking for a really intense, unadulterated peanut butter cookie, try these.
And if you’re a trail mix fan, I suggest you bake it into cookies.
It’ll be the best tasting trail mix you’ve ever had.
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Trail Mix Peanut Butter Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 cup creamy peanut butter, I prefer creamy honey roasted; plain may be used; do not use natural or homemade peanut butter
- 1 cup light brown sugar, packed
- 1 large egg
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- pinch salt, optional and to taste
- ⅓ cup old-fashioned whole rolled oats, not quick cook or instant
- use 1 heaping cup of your favorite pre-made trail mix, Check notes for Substitutions
Instructions
- To the mixing bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (or a mixing bowl using a hand mixer), combine peanut butter, brown sugar, egg, vanilla, and beat on medium-high speed until well-combined and the sugar is fully incorporated and is mixture is no longer gritty or granular, about 4 to 5 minutes. Stop to scrape down the bowl as necessary. (Regarding peanut butter - although natural peanut butter or homemade peanut butter may work, I recommend using storebought peanut butter like Jif, Skippy, Peter Pan or similar so that cookies bake up thicker and spread less. Using natural or homemade peanut butter tends to result in thinner and flatter cookies that are prone to spreading while baking)
- Add the baking soda, optional salt, oats, and beat to incorporate. Add the 1 heaping cup pre-made trail mix OR add the chocolate chips, raisins, M&Ms and beat to just incorporate. Using a 2-inch medium cookie scoop (about 2 tablespoons), form 16 dough mounds. Squeeze and compact the dough mounds so all the add-ins stay in place. They will be prone to falling out because they're abundant and dough is oily, just keep pushing them back in. Place dough mounds on a large plate. Flatten mounds slightly with your finger. Cover plate with plasticwrap and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, and up to 5 days, before baking. Do not bake with warm dough; cookies will spread and bake thin and flat.
- Preheat oven to 350F, line 2 baking sheets with Silpat Non-Stick Baking Mats, parchment, or spray with cooking spray. Place mounds on baking sheets, spaced about 2 inches apart. I bake 8 to a tray. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, until edges are set and tops are barely set, even if slightly underbaked in the center. Allow cookies to cool on trays for about 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling. Cookies may not appear to be done at 10 to 12 minutes, but they likely are, and they firm up as they cool. Baking longer results in cookies with dark or burnt bottoms and that set up too crisp and hard and don't keep well.
- Store cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 1 week, or in the freezer for up to 3 months. Alternatively, unbaked cookie dough can be stored airtight in the refrigerator for up to 5 days, so consider baking only as many cookies as desired and save the remaining dough to be baked in the future when desired.
- Take care all ingredients used, such as the oats or any add-ins, are gluten-free and suitable for your dietary needs.
- Adapted from Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies
Notes
- 1/3 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (or butterscotch, white, cinnamon chips)
- 1/3 cup raisins (I used TJ's raisin medley blend; try dried apricots, dates, cranberries, craisins)
- 1/3 cup Peanut Butter-Filled M&Ms (or another M&M variety; Reese's Pieces, mini PB Cups, mini Rolos, or any diced candy barl)
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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Do you like Trail Mix? What are your favorite trail mix add-ins?
Thanks for the entries in the Kitchen Grater and Zester Giveaway and the KithenAid 5-Quart Stand Mixer Giveaway!
I love trial mix too…it’s so addicting! These sound amazing and easy to make! Look forward to giving them a try!
LMK if you make them!
These look dangerous, well really all your treat are dangerous! Love the trail mix. So fun!
I love your honey mustard dressing in your last post. I make my own honey mustard https://www.loveveggiesandyoga.com/2012/05/spicy-honey-mustard.html because I love mustard so much!
These look so puffy, I love it! Its cranberries all the way in my trail mix. And pumpkin seeds!
Cranberries & pumpkin seeds sounds like a great fall cookie! (or anytime!)
Yum, love trail mix too. So addicting! I’ve never made up my own combo – try to stay away from it LOL. Love the idea of trail mix cookies.
I know. It really is better to just not start. Because once you do…mindless handfuls :)
M&M’s are a definite must for trail mix and all that texture from the oats and dried fruit makes for a great cookie to sink your teeth into! So many possibilities–I think I’d like some little pieces of dried banana chips in there too. I finally used my new food processor and made the fudgy brownie bites. My husband was hovering a little during the process–he loves those as much as I do!
So glad you got a new food proc and broke it in with the brownie bites. YAY! And that your hubs was hoovering. Too cute :)
And yes these are just so thick and chewy and tooth-sinking dense!
I absolutely LOVE these Averie! Kevin and I eat trail mix all the time and at the moment – have about 3 bottom-of-the-bag leftovers in the cupboards right now. Perfect excuse to use up all the extras so we can go buy fresh new bags of the stuff. I love trail mix, especially trail mix with M&Ms, lots of raisins, banana chips, and nuts! I make my won trail mix at those bulk bins in our grocery store. I go a little crazy in that aisle. :) And this peanut butter cookie base is amazing. I have yet to try a no flour peanut butter cookie. I really should because more and more folks these days around me are going GF. Your photos are always so tempting for me to stray from my favorite PB cookie base! Love the pretty M&Ms in these, especially those pink ones.
Sally I think you’ll love the flourless base. When I was recipe testing for PBC I was making batch after batch of both floured PB cookies and flourless. And side by side, I couldn’t tell you which one I liked more. They each had selling points, based on the day. Point being, I stack it up against a cookie with butter AND with flour, any day of the week. I tried a dough base similar to what you use I think for my coconut oil PB cookies. But that’s with melted oil not creamed butter, so it’s not a fair comparison. Plus coconut oil adds a diff flavor. I need to try your base at least once…right after I don’t have all this other baked stuff around :)
It is so cool these don’t have any flour. They’re still so puffy and thick. I haven’t had trail mix in years, but now I’m craving it and these cookies.
Chilled dough & tons of addins make for the puffy & thick cookies!
How have I never thought of putting trail mix in cookies?! GREAT idea, Averie! I love the little pops of red from the M&Ms :)
Leftover from Valentine’s Day :)
I can’t stop eating trail mix if it’s in the house either. Love the idea to put it in cookies.
It’s safer that way. Less temptation b/c after a couple cookies you just stop. After a couple handfuls of trailmix, you just keep going. Well, me anyway :)
What a great mid-afternoon energy snack. I love the other cookies you profiled also. I am the same with trail mix, one handful turns into two…
These sound delicious! I might have to be careful to make them with plenty of other people around so I don’t just eat the whole batch ;) One question, why wouldn’t you use homemade peanut butter? Is it because of the texture?
Baking with homemade PB in cookies is a no-no. Massive spreading issues can happen and they bake thinner and flatter. I have written in greater detail about it in the past.
https://www.loveveggiesandyoga.com/2013/01/peanut-butter-chocolate-chunk-cookies.html
https://www.loveveggiesandyoga.com/2013/02/thick-and-soft-chocolate-peanut-butter-cookies.html
That’s one very loaded cookie and how perfect is that! It would make a great snack anytime :)
Yep, definitely have the same problem when it comes to eating trail mix. :)
I love love love the flavors in these cookies! These would be great to bring along on a hike.
I feel like I should throw on a backpack and get al rugged when eating one of these! They’d be the perfect hiking fuel!