Coconut peanut butter fudge

Four ingredients, no oven, thirty minutes. The freezer stash you will not admit to.

The BetterDay Kitchen2 min read

This is a four ingredient fudge that needs no oven, no thermometer and no candy-making nerve. The food processor does the work, the freezer does the setting, and thirty minutes later you have twenty-one squares.

Coconut butter is the secret, and you make it yourself

The first step is blending desiccated coconut until it turns into coconut butter. It will look like sand for two minutes and you will be convinced it is not working. Keep going. Around the three to four minute mark the fat releases and it goes glossy and pourable all at once.

That coconut butter is what gives this fudge its structure. It sets firm in the cold and softens on the tongue, which is exactly what fudge is supposed to do.

Pick your peanut butter carefully

Use one where the ingredients are peanuts and salt. The sweetened, stabilised kind brings its own sugar and its own palm oil, and the fudge comes out cloying and slightly waxy. Natural peanut butter also means you control the sweetness with the maple.

The recipe

Coconut Peanut Butter Fudge

A no-bake fudge made from coconut butter, peanut butter, coconut oil and maple syrup. Sets in the freezer in 15 minutes.

Prep

30 min

Cook

None

Total

30 min

Makes

About 21 squares

Ingredients

  • 2 cups desiccated unsweetened coconut, finely shredded
  • 1 cup creamy natural peanut butter, ideally just peanuts and salt
  • 1/2 cup melted coconut oil
  • 3 to 5 tablespoons maple syrup, to taste
  • 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
  • 1 pinch sea salt, depending on how salty your peanut butter is
  • Optional: crushed peanuts or toasted coconut, for the top

Method

  1. 1Line a 9x5 inch loaf pan with parchment and set it aside.
  2. 2Add the desiccated coconut to a food processor and blend on high until it turns into a smooth, pourable butter. This takes about 4 minutes. Scrape the sides down as you go and do not give up early.
  3. 3Add the peanut butter and melted coconut oil and blend again until fully combined.
  4. 4Add the maple syrup one tablespoon at a time, blending between additions, until it is as sweet as you want it.
  5. 5Add the vanilla and sea salt and blend once more. Taste and adjust.
  6. 6Scrape into the lined pan and spread into an even layer. Scatter over crushed peanuts or toasted coconut if you like.
  7. 7Freeze until firm, about 15 minutes.
  8. 8Lift out by the parchment and slice into squares with a knife warmed under hot water and wiped dry.

Keeps

Up to 10 days in the fridge or 1 month in the freezer. From frozen, let it sit out 5 to 10 minutes before eating.

Chef’s note

Warm the knife between cuts. Cold fudge and a cold blade means cracked edges, and a hot blade goes through it like it is nothing.

Rather not cook tonight

We make this kind of food every week.

See this week’s menu

Read next