• 3 cups mini salted pretzels, hand-broken
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• ¼  tsp salt
• 1 stick unsalted butter, cold & cut into pieces
• 2 cups light brown sugar, firmly packed
• 1 cup creamy peanut butter
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla
• kosher salt for sprinkling

Special Equipment

• stand or electric hand mixer
• baking sheet
• cookie or ice cream scoop #20
• Silpat or parchment paper
• nonstick cooking spray (if not using Silpat or parchment paper)

1. Preheat oven to 300º
2. Break pretzels by hand into small pieces (about 6 pieces per pretzel). Be careful not to crush the pretzels, leaving as much hard outside layer intact as possible
3. In a bowl, combine flour, baking soda, salt and pretzel pieces. Set aside
4. With a stand or electric hand mixer, cream butter, sugar together, and peanut butter on medium speed until smooth and no butter pieces are visible, about 2 minutes. Turn off mixer and scrape down sides of bowl
5. With mixer on medium speed, add eggs, one at time, and vanilla extract. Mix until combined. Scrape down bowl, and turn mixer up to medium-high speed. Mix 2 more minutes, until light and fluffy
6. Add dry ingredients to mixing bowl all at once. Mix on low speed briefly, to incorporate most of flour. Finish mixing by hand. The dough will be sticky
7. Refrigerate dough for 20 minutes until firm and form-able. Using a small ice cream scoop (#20-size yellow scoop) or heaping tablespoon, form cookies into balls, then flatten slightly into discs with the palm of your hand (about 1½" diameter and ½" thick)
8. Space 6-8 cookies evenly on a parchment or Silpat-lined baking sheet. You can also spray a baking sheet with nonstick cooking spray
9. Sprinkle tops generously with kosher salt
10. Bake cookies for 14-16 minutes, rotating the sheet halfway through baking to assure even cooking, until golden in color. Cookies may look slightly under-baked when removed. This is OK, as they will continue cooking slightly on the baking sheet