Reese's Fast Break Peanut Butter Nougat Candy Recipe
A copy of the Reese's Fast Break bar: a layer of soft nougat, a layer of peanut butter and a milk chocolate coating. Sixteen bars from an 8-inch pan.
- Total
- 2 hr 10 min
- Serves
- 16
- Calories (est.)
- 295
A Reese's Fast Break is a layer of chewy nougat and a layer of peanut butter under milk chocolate. This copy makes the nougat from marshmallow creme and a sugar syrup cooked to 250°F, spreads a peanut butter layer over it, cuts the chilled slab into sixteen bars and dips them in melted milk chocolate. Thirty minutes of work and about ninety of chilling.
What is in a Reese's Fast Break
Hershey describes the bar by its three parts: chewy nougat, peanut butter and chocolate. Its ingredient list begins with sugar, peanuts and corn syrup, and one 51-gram bar has 240 calories.
This is a reconstruction of those three layers, not Hershey's recipe. MakeFoodLovely is not connected with Hershey or Reese's.
Recipe
Reese's Fast Break Bars
A reconstruction of the Reese's Fast Break — soft nougat made from marshmallow creme, a peanut butter layer and a milk chocolate coating. Sixteen bars.
- Prep
- 30 min
- Cook
- 10 min
- Total
- 2 hr 10 min
- Serves
- 16
- Cuisine
- American
Ingredients
- For the nougat:
- 1 cup marshmallow creme
- 3 tablespoons creamy peanut butter
- 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 2 tablespoons heavy cream
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- For the peanut butter layer:
- 3/4 cup creamy peanut butter
- 1/2 cup powdered sugar
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
- For the coating:
- 2 cups milk chocolate chips (12 ounces)
- 1 tablespoon coconut oil
Instructions
- Line an 8-inch square pan with parchment paper, leaving an overhang on two sides. Stir the marshmallow creme, the 3 tablespoons of peanut butter and the vanilla together in a heatproof bowl.
- Heat the sugar, cream and 2 tablespoons of butter in a small saucepan over medium-high heat, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Then cook without stirring to 250°F on a candy thermometer, 4 to 5 minutes.
- Pour the hot syrup into the marshmallow mixture and stir until smooth and fluffy. Spread it in the pan and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
- Beat the 3/4 cup of peanut butter with the powdered sugar and the softened butter until smooth. Spread it over the nougat and freeze for 30 minutes, until firm.
- Lift the slab out and cut it into 16 bars, 4 inches by 1 inch. Return the bars to the freezer while the chocolate melts.
- Melt the chocolate chips with the coconut oil in a bowl over barely simmering water, or in the microwave in 30-second bursts, stirring until smooth.
- Dip each cold bar in the chocolate with two forks, let the excess drip off and set it on parchment. Refrigerate for 30 minutes, until the coating is hard.
Nutrition
- Calories:
- 295
Calculated from the ingredient quantities above using the USDA FoodData Central database, then divided by the number of servings. It is an estimate and will vary with the exact products you use.
A Fast Break nougat without egg whites
Candy-bar nougat is traditionally made by pouring hot sugar syrup into whipped egg whites. The shortcut used here replaces the egg whites with marshmallow creme, which is already a whipped sugar foam.
It is the method Kelsey Nixon uses for her candy bars on Food Network: sugar, cream and butter cooked to 250°F and stirred into marshmallow creme and peanut butter. The quantities here are scaled down to an 8-inch pan.
The temperature decides the texture. At 250°F the syrup sets the nougat firm enough to cut and soft enough to chew. Below about 240°F it stays sticky and will not hold a clean edge.
Dipping the bars
- Cold bars. Frozen bars set the chocolate on contact and do not shed peanut butter into the bowl.
- Coconut oil thins the melted chocolate so the coating does not go on thick. Shortening does the same.
- Two forks. Lower the bar in, lift it out flat and tap the fork on the rim of the bowl.
- Milk chocolate, as on the original. A chopped milk chocolate bar melts more smoothly than chips, which are made to hold their shape.
The Dubai chocolate bar on this site uses the same melted chocolate in a mould instead of as a dip.
Keeping them
Two weeks in a covered container in the refrigerator, three months in the freezer. They are best eaten cold; at room temperature the coating softens.
Other no-bake sweets on this site are the peanut butter cheesecake balls and the haystack cookies.
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