Chocolate & Peanut Butter Ribbon Dessert

Scott has requested that we make this dessert every year as a Christmas tradition, we love it so much. This frozen dessert is fairly simple, extremely rich, and a wonderful treat for the holiday season.  But be careful!  You only need a small piece.

Chocolate & Peanut Butter Ribbon Dessert

Ingredients:

• 12 NUTTER BUTTER Cookies, divided
• 2 Tbsp.  butter, melted
• 1 pkg. (8 oz.) PHILADELPHIA Cream Cheese, softened
• 1/2 cup  creamy peanut butter
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 2 tsp.  vanilla
• 1 tub (12 oz.) COOL WHIP Whipped Topping, thawed, divided
• 2 squares  BAKER'S Semi-Sweet Chocolate, melted

Directions:

1. CRUSH 8 cookies; mix with butter. Press onto bottom of foil-lined 9x5-inch loaf pan.
2. MIX next 4 ingredients with mixer until well blended. Whisk in 3 cups COOL WHIP; spoon 1/2 cup into small bowl. Blend in melted chocolate. Spoon half the remaining cream cheese mixture over crust; top with layers of chocolate mixture and remaining cream cheese mixture.
3. FREEZE 4 hours or until firm. Invert onto plate. Remove foil, then re-invert dessert onto serving platter so crumb layer is on bottom. Coarsely break remaining cookies. Top dessert with remaining COOL WHIP and broken cookies.

Marsha's Notes:

You can see in this next picture that I used a piece of parchment paper to line my loaf pan, which I held in place with binder clips while I was assembling that dessert. It made it really easy to remove the loaf from the pan for slicing. I also added the top layer of whipped cream and crushed cookies during the assembly process and then stuck the entire thing in the freezer to harden (as opposed to adding these items just before serving after everything else was frozen). I think it's just easier to do it all at once and then clean up your mess.

If you weren't sure, this is a binder clip. I just keep a few in my kitchen drawer for things like this recipe.