Let’s talk ice cream toppings this morning. Do you ever eat your ice cream plain or are there always toppings involved? I don’t need a lot to make me happy, but at the very least there have to be sprinkles. I don’t care if they’re chocolate or rainbow, but they’re not optional. If I’m going all out and adding a sauce and whipped cream too, I’m most likely to choose strawberry sauce. It has to be the good stuff with chunks of real strawberries though! I’m honestly not much of a hot fudge person, even where it makes the most sense. Growing up my combination of choice was always mint chocolate chip ice cream with strawberry sauce, which people usually told me was a really odd pairing. To each his own, right?
It’s only recently that I’ve started to fall in love with peanut butter sauce too, and this homemade peanut butter caramel sauce has a lot to do with that. It was about a month ago that I stumbled upon the recipe and immediately ran to the kitchen to give it a try. If you’ve ever made traditional caramel sauce, the process here is nearly identical – except at the last minute you stir in a big scoop of creamy peanut butter! It immediately transforms the caramel into the most luxuriously thick and creamy sauce; I can almost guarantee you’ll just want to eat it by the spoonful. The flavor is very similar to a traditional peanut butter sauce but it has caramel notes that give it a little more sweetness and depth.
You can do a ton of things with this sauce, it’s really versatile. I ended up baking with most of mine, and I’ll be sharing those recipes with you later this week. If you’d rather keep things simple, the peanut butter caramel sauce is an amazing dip – perfect with apples, bananas, chocolate graham crackers, and anything else you can think of. Alternatively, drizzle it over brownies, apple pie or even chocolate cake. There aren’t too many places this sauce wouldn’t be appropriate!
And yes, peanut butter caramel sauce also goes well with mint chocolate chip ice cream in case you were wondering π
Peanut Butter Caramel Sauce
slightly adapted from Bobby Flay (via Food Network)
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
1 tablespoon light corn syrup
pinch sea salt
1/8 teaspoon vanilla extract
Add the heavy cream to a small saucepan and set over medium-low heat. You just want the cream to be lukewarm – don’t boil it. Add the sugar and water to a second small saucepan and swirl the pan to combine. Set over medium to medium-high heat and bring the mixture to a boil without stirring. Cover the pan and continue cooking for two minutes (the steam will wash down the sides of the pan). Remove the cover and continue cooking (without stirring) until the caramel becomes amber in color. Gradually whisk in the warm cream, mixing until the mixture is smooth (if some of the caramel seizes, just reduce the heat to low and continue cooking until it melts). Remove the pan from the heat and whisk in the peanut butter, corn syrup, salt, and vanilla until well combined and smooth. Transfer to a heatproof jar.
Once cool, store the sauce in the refrigerator for up to 1 week. It will thicken considerably in the fridge – to serve either warm it gently in a small saucepan or in the microwave until fluid.
OMG! You totally had me at peanut butter and now I want a really big spoon… π
Too funny! I just made Peanut butter Caramel sauce for a recipe I am working on! The stuff is SO good! I bet it would be awesome on top of ice cream!
Tracey this looks incredible! I’m a HUGE PB fan and of caramel sauce, too! I just made some salted caramel sauce over the weekend. I should have added PB, too! Beautiful!
I’m usually too lazy for sauces on ice cream but when I do it’s either caramel or peanut butter which means this is exactly what I need in my life.
All I need is a spoon!
I loooove pb sauce and pb caramel sauce? YESSS
Oh my goodness – wish I had a spoonful of this right now! Combining PB and caramel is brilliant!
Huge fan of ice cream toppings and this one is going to be a new one.
This kind of stuff is so dangerous for me to have around. I can be so healthy so much of the time, then things like this come around that make me lose my willpower altogether! I would definitely eat this by the spoonful.
I rarely think of toppings when I have ice cream, cause I usually am chowing down on some crazy ice cream flavor already, or maybe two O:-). But I would never turn this down!
Oh, no. I should not have seen this. It sounds too dangerous. I’m not usually an ice cream topping person, but this changes my mind.
oh goodness! I just ate an apple with pb and I wish I’d had this instead! π
mmm….I wanna dip apples in this!
OH MY GOD! That’s all I have to say π
I love peanut butter and I love caramel. What is not to love about this sauce??
I can’t stand to have normal ice cream (i.e. just vanilla or just chocolate) it HAS to have some sort of mix in already in it. With that said i only eat plain vanilla ice cream if there is piping hot fudge on top. That stuff is like God’s gift to man. But I’m really liking the look of this peanut butter caramel stuff. It looks absolutely amazing! π
I pretty much always need rainbow sprinkles on my ice cream…but this peanut butter caramel sauce is going to become a go-to as well! I can’t think of anything better.
omg, can i DRINK this?! ahh this looks ridiculously awesome!!
I would put this on my ice cream in a heartbeat…or straight up on a spoon–who are we kidding! Though I’m a little skeptical about how it goes with mint chip! π I’ll have to trust you there.
I want to eat this straight from the jar!
I had a friend who used to mix peanut butter in those little caramel dipping packet you get at the grocery store for apples. I had it will apples and it was so good. I can only imagine how much better this version would be!
All I need is a jar of this and a spoon π
Yuuuum! And yes, sprinkles are always a requirement. Always.
Oh my gosh, I would be dumping this on vanilla or chocolate ice cream!
Whoa – I could take a bath in this!
I don’t know about mint chocolate chip, but I’d definitely put this over some moose tracks in a hurry. It looks amazing.
Yum! I need this asap!
Delicious! Can’t wait to give this a try.
I always had to have sprinkles on my ice cream! I have never had pb sauce on it, let alone pb caramel. I am imagining all the amazing things to do with this.
Will it affect the result if corn syrup isn’t used? Will it still be delicious or not quite as good? It’s very difficult to come by where I come from.
This would be great to can to give as gifts.
Could you post how to do that?