The Peanut Butter Blossom Cookie Was Created To Fix A Total Baking Fail

It's not hard to understand why the iconic peanut butter blossom cookie has become a fixture in the repertoire of many a home baker. The soft, sugar-rolled treat is tender and packed with roasted, salty peanut butter flavor, while the legendary Hershey's candy sits at its center, delivering a satisfying chocolate fix. But what is its origin story?

It turns out that this cookie didn't originate in the test kitchens of the Hershey company or even a professional bakery; a home baker concocted it. In 1957, Freda Smith submitted this soon-to-be classic to a National Bake Off in Gibsonburg, Ohio. The competition, hosted by Pillsbury (which, in case you missed it, now offers ready-to-bake cookie and brownie dough you can eat raw as well as Funfetti frosting with whimsical sprinkles), was held in hopes of encouraging home bakers to come up with new baked treats using their products. While the official winner was a baker named Gerda Roderer, who entered something known as accordion treats (a French cookie made with vanilla and walnuts), it was the peanut butter blossom that most remember and revisit today. But had it not been for the fact that Smith had forgotten to restock her chocolate chip stash, we may never have experienced this iconic treat.

Where did Freda Smith find such inspiration? She may have been the one to cap her cookie with a kiss, but the combination of peanut butter and chocolate was already well-loved (as evidenced by the invention of the Reese's Peanut Butter Cup in 1928), so the chances were pretty good that her flavor profile would hold popular appeal. Still, it turns out that these cookies weren't Smith's first choice for her submission. She actually entered twice — first with a pastry-like confection — and then, as an eleventh-hour idea, the blossom we know and love today.

According to her daughter, these cookies weren't created for the competition but to delight Smith's family. She baked some peanut butter cookies for her grandsons one night, felt they needed a little something extra, and — realizing she had run out of chocolate chips — reached for the ubiquitous Hershey Kisses in her cabinet. When she placed them in the center, not only did they not melt from the heat of the warm cookie, but they created a little crackle effect. The name "blossom" refers to the fact that Smith felt they resembled black-eyed Susan flowers.

Following the competition, the recipe was published in several cookbooks, and Freda Smith's cookies found an audience. Within a decade, articles declared the blossom an ideal treat for everything from picnics to holiday season celebrations (of which it is a mainstay today).

In 1999, the peanut butter blossom was inducted into the Pillsbury Bake-Off Hall of Fame and was even highlighted in the Smithsonian Museum's National Museum of American History. It continues to be a perennial favorite in major publications and modern cookbooks — not to mention on countless blogs. You can still readily find the recipe for the classic, as well as new, inspired takes in flavors that include everything from coconut and almonds to mint and hot cocoa and even pumpkin spice — a far cry from their strictly peanut butter origins.

Pillsbury continued its competition for more than fifty years, although, in 2022, it also changed the rules: Contestants were forbidden to use actual ovens. (The winner that year created an air fryer recipe.) While Smith didn't take home the top honor all those years ago, she earned the title of senior grand national winner, along with a hundred bucks and a new mixer and range. But the cookies have easily secured a prime spot on our dessert tables and in our hearts.