How Much Peanut Butter is inside Peanut Butter Cups?

By Rob Cockerham | June 7, 2010

Reese's peanut butter cups are hands-down the best candy in the world. Everyone loves them.

Peanut butter cups were invented in 1984, when a high-school principal walking through the halls with a chocolate bar ran headlong into the school librarian, who was snacking out of an open jar of peanut butter. Their collision resulted in a chocolate bar encrused with peanut butter, as well as a wad of peanut butter dotted with chocolate shards.

Delicious.

Just mixing peanut butter with chocolate isn't good enough. The chocolate-to-peanut butter proportions have to be right. Otherwise you end up snacking on chocolate which is under or over-peanuted.

For many years, I depended upon Reeses to get the chocolate to peanut butter ratio correct, but then something unexpected happened: Reese's Peanut Butter Cups Miniatures.

Reese's Peanut Butter Cups Miniatures are better. They are smaller, individually foil wrapped, preciously minute peanut butter cups. They have the same delicate fluted edges.. ok, maybe not quite as many fluted edges, but they have the same effect in my mouth.

What's the difference? How could the miniature cups taste better? Is it the peanut butter? On Thursday night, we decided to find out.



A visit to the store revealed the two sizes of Reese's Peanut Butter cups: Regular and Miniature. Also, it revealed the "Snack a Pack" cups, the "King Size" cups, "Snack Size", and "Big Cup" sizes. Unbelievable!

Reese's has more cup sizes than Fredricks of Hollywood.

A bag of miniature peanut butter cups sell for $2.99.

The bag holds 38 mini cups. Each weighs about 9 grams. That's 8¢ each, or 0.87¢ per gram.

Mini Cups - $4 per pound.

Slightly larger are the Snack-A-Pack cups. Once you unwrap them, they are noticably smaller than regular peanut butter cups. An eight-pack sells for $1.27. Each weighs 15.4 grams. That's about 16¢ each or 1.03¢ per gram.

Snack-a-pack cups - $4.67 per pound

A bit larger than that are the King Size peanut butter cups.

They should probably be renamed the "Emperor of the French" Size, because they are also smaller than regular cups. A four-pack costs $1.09. Each weighs 19.9grams and costs 27¢ each. That's 1.37¢ per gram.

King Size cups - $6.20 per pound

Next, verging on, or perhaps as large as regular cups, there are the bags of "Snack Size" cups. A bag of 14 cost $3.19, or 22½¢ each. The one I weighed was 21.4 grams, coming at a price of 1.07¢ per gram. These cups were just a hair shy of full size. In fact, it may have been within the acceptable weight variation of a full-sized peanut butter cup. Why would they make five different sized cups, only to call these full-sized clones "Snack sized"?

Snack Size cups - $4.85 per pound

In case you need reminding, full-sized cups come in a two-pack. They cost about 67¢, thats 33½¢ each cup. They weigh 21.8 grams each, at 1.6¢ per gram.

Regular 2-Pack - $7.25 per pound

And finally, there are the Reese's Peanut Butter cups Big Cups. A six cup pack costs $3.04. That's 51¢ a cup. Mine weighed 39.9 grams, and at 51¢ per cup, that's 1.27¢ per gram.

Big Cups - $5.75 per pound.

I had my results.

The ancient mysteries of peanut butter cup sizes had begun to reveal themselves.

Nicolas Cage even helped me put together this fancy graphic.

The results spoke clearly. Not only were miniature peanut butter cups the most delicious, they were also the cheapest.

How was this possible?

It was time to open these peanut cups open and see how much is inside.

Like a Malaysian pearl fisherman, I sliced open a chocolate cup and pryed out the precious peanut butter center. I positioned the hunks of chocolate on my digital scale and held my breath.

The chocolate shell weighed 11.9 grams, the peanutty center 9.3 grams. That's 43% peanut butter wrapped in 56% chocolate. A delicious ratio, but clearly inferior to the spectacular glory of Reese's mini cups.

I carefully zeroed out the scale and repeated my actions with a Reese's mini cup. The chocolate alone was 5.6 grams. The peanut butter was 3.1 grams! Ah ha! More chocolate! This mix of 35% peanut butter and 65% chocolate yields the most delicious ratio!

Why then are the miniature cups, with an extra margin of chocolate, actually less expensive than the regular cups? Shouldn't mini cups, with 9% more chocolate be 9% more expensive?

Could it be that the peanut butter actually costs MORE than the chocolate?

I'd unlocked the mystery of peanut butter cups, the mystery of deliciousness. It's the ratio of 65% chocolate to 35% peanut butter. Simple.

You're welcome Godiva.