Peanut Butter Pie – inspired by the Magnolia Bakery Peanut Butter Pie, this decadent dessert is filled with a peanut butter cream cheese center on top of a graham cracker and pretzel crust with caramel sauce.
Peanut Butter Pie with Graham Cracker and Pretzel Crust
I know you’re scratching your head thinking, “what on earth is a pie recipe doing on Courtney’s blog?!” Yes, it’s true, I’m not a huge pie lover, HOWEVER, a pie with a graham cracker and pretzel crust is a pie I can stand behind!
Years ago I made a Magnolia Bakery Peanut Butter Pie that filled a deep-dish 9-inch pie pan with a Nilla wafer crust, peanut butter and cream cheese filling and caramel. It was heavenly! I haven’t had it in years and suddenly started dreaming about it. As I thought about looking for the recipe, I wondered if I could create my own version. I remember thinking the original was a little too rich for me (like, how is that even possible?).
So instead of hunting down the recipe, I decided to create my own version of this decadent dessert!
Pie Crust
While I’m not one for a pastry pie crust, I love a cookie crust, a pretzel crust, or a graham cracker crust. Combine any of those two elements, and you’ve got yourself a serious winner in my book! Magnolia Bakery uses a Nilla wafer crust, but I decided to go with a mixture of a graham cracker and pretzel crust to maximize the sweet and salty flavor combinations.
To make the crust, you’ll simply combine all of the ingredients in a food processor and blend until you have a “wet sand-like” mixture. Once the crust is made, you’ll press the crumbs firmly into a pie pan. I used a deep-dish 8-inch pie pan, but a standard pie pan will work beautifully since this pie isn’t as thick as the original.
Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Filling
The original Magnolia Bakery recipe has three blocks of cream cheese in the filling! Three! It was a little too much cream cheese for my taste, so I lowered the amount of cream cheese in my recipe to one 8-oz block of cream cheese. I really want the peanut butter to stand out, rather than the cream cheese.
To make the filling, you’ll start by whipping the heavy whipping cream, powdered sugar and vanilla to stiff peaks. Next, grab another bowl and combine the cream cheese and peanut butter, and mix until combined. To finish, fold the whipped cream into the peanut butter mixture.
Whip cream, powdered sugar and vanilla to stiff peaks. Beat peanut butter and cream cheese until combined. Fold the whipped cream into the peanut butter mixture. Add filling on top of crust that has been coated with caramel.
Caramel
Before adding this incredible filling to the pie, you’ll first coat the crust with homemade caramel (see picture above). Again, just another element of sweet and salty that makes this pie so dang amazing!
To top it off, sprinkle on salted peanuts, chopped chocolate peanut butter cups and more salted caramel.
This one is best served cold, so it’s a great dessert to make ahead of time. Just be sure to cover it and store in the refrigerator.
Truly an easy pie recipe you’ll love even if you don’t love pie!
Other Recipes You May Like
- The Most Delicious Caramel Cake
- Dark Chocolate Salted Caramel Cake
- Peanut Butter Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Untraditional Carrot Cake with Apricot Filling and White Chocolate Buttercream
- Chocolate Pretzel Cake
Peanut Butter Pie
Ingredients
FOR THE CRUST
- 1 cup crushed pretzels
- 9 graham crackers full rectangles
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter melted
- 1/4 cup granulated sugar
FOR THE FILLING
- 8 oz cream cheese
- 1 cup peanut butter smooth
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream
- 1/2 cup powdered sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
FOR THE CARAMEL
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 4 Tbsp water
- 2 tsp light corn syrup
- 3/4 cup heavy whipping cream
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tsp salt
Garnish
- Salted peanuts
- Chocolate peanut butter cups
Instructions
For the Crust
- Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F. Spray an 8-inch pie pan with nonstick spray and set aside.
- In a food processor, combine the pretzels, graham cracker crumbs, melted butter and granulated sugar. Pulse until the mixture resembles "wet sand."
- Firmly press the crust into the pie pan, pushing it up against the sides a bit.
- Bake the crust for 7 minutes and then remove from oven to cool completely before assembly.
For the Filling
- In a medium size bowl, combine the peanut butter and cream cheese and mix until combined. Mixture will be slightly thick. Set aside.
- In a stainless steel bowl, beat the whipping cream, powdered sugar and vanilla on medium-high speed until still peaks form.
- Fold the whipped cream into the peanut butter mixture until smooth. (See picture above).
For the Caramel
- Mix sugar, water and corn syrup in a small saucepan.
- Bring the water and sugar mixture to boil over medium heat, but DO NOT STIR. (Stirring encourages crystallization). Let the mixture cook until it caramelizes into a golden brown color. It happens quickly, so keep an eye on it.
- Remove the caramelized sugar syrup from the heat and slowly mix in the cream. Pour in just a tiny bit at a time, especially at the beginning, and mix to combine. You can start adding more and more as you go along.
- Mix in salt and vanilla. Stir to combine. Let cool to room temperature.
Assembly
- Once the crust is cooled completely, pour about ¾ of the caramel onto the crust and spread on the bottom and the sides with the back of a spoon.
- Pour all of the filling into the pie pan, on top of the caramel, and spread evenly.
- Sprinkle the top with peanuts, chocolate peanut butter cups and the remaining caramel.
Hi! I’m very much looking forward to making this, but I was wondering if the corn syrup can be omitted…?
Not if you’re making homemade caramel. You can always buy caramel from the store instead.
Love the sound of this pie. Could Almond butter be used instead of peanut butter? We have all nut allergies with the exception of almonds.
Sure!
Hi Courtney! Such a great recipe for Father’s Day! Can this be made in advance and stored in the fridge or freezer? Thanks!
Yes! Freezer is best!
Holy moly, this is GOOD! So easy and quick too!
This was amazing.. I used sunflower butter instead because I have allergy. It was still fantastic. I didn’t make the caramel though, just because I’m not a caramel person.
Love that for you!
Best pie I have ever tasted
That’s so nice to hear!
Could you sub a chocolate sauce for the w caramel? Which one from your blog would you recommend?
Sure!
I have been dreaming about this pie ever since Courtney posted the recipe and now I finally have the time to make it! It was everything I hoped it would be 🙂
Hi Courtney, as far as I’m concerned, I like all your recipes, be they for cake or pie. Bring it on 🙂
Love to hear it!
I’ve used many of your cake recipes and they are exceptional🙃! Thank you. The Dodo Restaurant in SLC has a YUMMY Peanut Butter Cream Cheese pie – my husband & I are addicted to it, so I was excited about your recipe Peanut Butter Cream Cheese pie! I loved the filling (similar to the Dodo’s), but I had trouble with the Carmel. After 3 attempts, I bought the carmel. Perhaps it may be helpful to include the temp. the sugar/water/corn syrup should reach??? Anyway, it was delicious, but the Dodo’s is spectacular. It has a chocolate layer over the peanut butter/cream cheese filling. They won’t share the recipe.
We are so excited to make this! We love all of your recipes.
Is the caramel recipe for this pie supposed to be different from your regular caramel sauce? We tried it but it came out super salty and I noticed that your other recipe had double the sugar but the same amount of heavy cream. We weren’t sure if it was intentionally different.
Yes it was intentional to create a bigger contrast of sweet and salty
Would this work with Peter’s Caramel and just add the amount of salt called for?
You would need to add some cream and salt so that the caramel doesn’t harden.
I made this for a family Christmas. It’s SO good and the recipe is very easy to follow. I will definitely make again!
Looks delicious! Plan on making it for Thanksgiving. Could I use store bought caramel you think? Thanks.
yes!
The caramel comes out as thin as water. should there really be only 2 teaspoons of corn syrup?
I just got thru making it and I had too much crumb crust for my 9 in pie dish. Then when i poured in the 3/4 cup of carmel onto the crust it was way too much. So when I added the filling it swelled up all around the edges. I’m just concerned if the Carmel turns hard will it be difficult to eat. Unfortunately it’s going tomorrow to a party so please send me good news. lol.
I have made a few of your cakes and gotten very good results.
This definitely is a pie with a thick crust, so I like to use a deeper 9″ pan and push the crumbs up the side as well. For the caramel, it won’t harden like a candy, so you should be ok. Hope you loved it.