National I Want Butterscotch Day Date in the current year: February 15, 2024

Butterscotch is similar to toffee and fudge in that all three confections are made with sugar and butter as their primary ingredients. The difference between butterscotch and toffee is that toffee is heated until the hard crack stage (295 to 309 °F), while butterscotch is heated to the soft crack stage (270 to 289 °F); besides, butterscotch is made with brown sugar, whereas toffee can be made with white sugar. Fudge differs from both in that it contains milk in addition to sugar and butter.

Butterscotch is believed to have been invented in Yorkshire sometime around the first half of the 19th century, as evidenced by the earliest found recipes. By the mid-19th century, several rival confectioners in Doncaster sold the candy. The one that really lucked out was S. Parkinson & Sons: when Queen Victoria visited the town in 1851, she was presented with a tin of Parkinson’s butterscotch. That’s how the confection became known outside Yorkshire. Several decades later, butterscotch was brought to the United States and became popular there as well.

Today, the term “butterscotch” is used to refer not only to the confection itself, but also to the combined flavor of butter and brown sugar, even if the food item in question contains no actual butterscotch, such as butterscotch pudding or butterscotch liqueur. Butterscotch sauce is a popular addition to various desserts and drinks. It is cooked similar to butterscotch candy, but it is heated to a lower temperature (240 °F) and contains cream alongside butter and brown sugar.

To celebrate National I Love Butterscotch Day, try your hand at cooking butterscotch candies and/or butterscotch sauce. Let’s start with candies. In a medium saucepan, combine ½ cup brown sugar, ½ cup white sugar, ½ cup water, ¼ cup melted butter, 2 tsp vinegar, and a pinch of salt. Cover the saucepan and bring to a boil over medium heat.

Remove the lid and heat to 270 to 289 °F. Do not stir while heating! Pour in ½ tsp vanilla extract, remove from heat and pour into a generously buttered baking pan. Allow the butterscotch cool slightly and cut it into small squares, then let the sweets cool completely.

To make butterscotch sauce, melt 4 tbsp unsalted butter in a heavy bottomed saucepan. Add a cup of dark brown sugar and stir with a wooden spoon until all sugar is soaked with butter. Heat the mixture for 3–5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the sugar is molten. At this point, lower the heat and whisk ¾ cup heavy whipping cream into the mixture.

Turn the heat back to medium and heat the mixture to 225 °F (it should take about 10 minutes), whisking occasionally. Remove the sauce from heat and let it rest for a couple of minutes, then transfer into a heatproof vessel. When the sauce cools to room temperature, whisk in 1 tbsp vanilla extract and 1 tsp kosher salt to even out the taste.