Peanut Butter & Jelly Sandwich
212kcal6.8g protein9.1g fat27.8g carbs*Estimates computed from the ingredient list; cost uses average US supermarket prices. Not a substitute for packaging measurements or your receipt.
Contains gluten, peanut · only in an optional ingredient: dairy
Restrictions
Containsgluten · peanutIt is in an ingredient you cannot leave out.
Only if you add itdairy (butter)Leave that ingredient out and the dish does not have it.
Diets
Vegetarian · without oneVegan · without onePescatarian · without oneNo pork · without oneNo alcohol
Worked out from the ingredient list. It knows nothing about brands, shared equipment or cross contamination, and it is not a certification — if you have an allergy, you still have to read the label.
Ingredients
Servings:
| 2 slice | soft sandwich bread, white or wheat |
| 2 tbsp | peanut butter, creamy or crunchy |
| 1 ½ tbsp | grape jelly or fruit jam |
Optional
Not counted above. The dish works without them.
| 2 tsp | butter (softened, for the griddled version) |
| 1 unit | banana (sliced thin) |
| ¼ cup | potato chips (whole, laid in) |
| 2 slice | bacon (cooked crisp) |
| 1 pinch | salt (a pinch over the peanut butter) |
Steps
- measure1 mintwo tablespoons peanut butter against one and a half of jellypeanut butter and jelly, portioned before either touches the bread. The ratio is the only thing in this sandwich that can be got wrong: the filling has no structure, so anything past about three and a half tablespoons total on standard sandwich bread has nowhere to go and slides out sideways under bite pressure. Keep the fruit layer the thinner of the two — jelly is the wetter and more mobile half, and it is what leaks first
- top1 minboth slices, spread edge to edgebread + peanut butter spread over the whole face of both slices, right into the corners. Two reasons, and only the second is about taste. Fat does not mix with the water and sugar in jelly, so a continuous peanut butter layer on both slices is a barrier that stops the fruit from wetting the crumb — this is what keeps a lunchbox sandwich from going translucent and tearing by midday. And edge-to-edge coverage means the last bite has filling in it, which a centred blob does not. Peanut butter straight from the refrigerator will drag and tear soft bread; let the jar come to room temperature or work it smooth first
- top1 minjelly onto one peanut-buttered face, kept inside the crust line+ jelly spread over the peanut butter on one slice, stopping about a quarter inch short of the edge, then close the sandwich. The jelly sits on fat rather than on bread, which is the whole point of the previous step. Leaving a clean margin gives the filling somewhere to spread when the sandwich is pressed together, instead of being squeezed straight out onto whoever is holding it
- slice1 minsingle downward cut, not a sawing motionthe closed sandwich, cut once through the middle — diagonally or straight across. Press down cleanly rather than sawing back and forth: a serrated saw drags the top slice against the bottom one and shears the filling out of the cut face. If it is not being eaten now, wrap it whole and cut it later, because two cut edges dry out roughly twice as fast as none