Reese’s Peanut Butter Ice Cream Cake

My brother joined the navy earlier this year. We are very close – he actually has lived with me for most of the last 3 years.

He came to town on leave to surprise me. He’s been gone for 6 months, and this was the first time in our lives we’ve been away from each other for more than a couple weeks. It was a really good surprise, I cried for like 20 minutes straight. My sneaky husband knew everything and got it all on video. 🙂

While he was here we had a big family BBQ so everyone could see him. I (of course) asked to bring dessert. My brother is after all my best fan tester.

I had been eyeing this cake by Lindsay for a while now, and I knew an ice cream cake would be a perfect summer BBQ dessert that would impress not only my brother, but the entirety of my sweets loving family.

I decided to switch up her recipe a bit. Mostly because (and I know I’m in the minority here) I don’t think caramel and peanut butter belong together. Both are fabulous and both pair perfectly with chocolate, but I like to keep them separate.

Also – this cake is SOOO easy to make. If you can bake a box of brownies, you can make this ice cream cake!

Reese’s Peanut Butter Ice Cream Cake – adapted from Life, Love and Sugar

Ingredients:

1 box brownie mix, plus ingredients called for on box (I used fat free brownies)

8 oz brick cream cheese (I used 1/3 less fat)

1/4 cup milk

1/2 cup sugar

1 1/2 cups creamy peanut butter

8 oz Cool Whip, thawed (I used fat free)

Chocolate Syrup

Large bag Reese’s Miniatures, unwrapped and chopped

Directions:

1. Bake brownies in greased 13×9 pan, but reduce baking time to only 20 minutes. Let cool completely.

2. With stand mixer or electric hand mixer, beat together cream cheese, milk, sugar, and peanut butter until completely combined.

 

3. Carefully fold Cool Whip into peanut butter mixture.

4. Top cooled brownies with 1 cup of chocolate syrup. Spread all the way to the edges.

 

5. Drop chopped Reese’s on top of the chocolate syrup in an even but hearty layer.

6. Cover Reese’s in peanut butter mixture and spread smooth.

7. Cover entire pan in plastic wrap and freeze at least 4 hours, or overnight.

8. When ready to eat, cut cake into squares and top each square with more chocolate syrup and chopped Reese’s.

This cake is extremely rich. My brother and my family loved it. Honestly it was a little bit too rich for me to handle, but I’m not a huge chocolate fan anyway so don’t necessarily take my word for it. 😉

I used fat free/low fat everything I could for this recipe. I figured why not – there’s enough sugar in it anyway it’s definitely not going to be low on flavor! Feel free to use the full-fat version if you prefer!