Butterscotch chips are something of a novelty in the chocolate chip aisle at the grocery store. Butterscotch itself is a thick dessert syrup made with brown sugar and butter. It has a rich, buttery sweetness that goes well with many other flavors. Butterscotch chips typically have a brown sugar and butter flavor to them and are a much easier way to add some sweetness to a recipe than dealing with butterscotch syrup (which is much more difficult to mix into a batch of cookies!).
Butterscotch chips are generally made with sugar, some type of vegetable shortening, milk, natural/artificial flavorings and colorings to capture that amber butterscotch color. Guittard’s Butterscotch Chips are no exception, but unlike other butterscotch chips they use real vanilla and, while sweet, don’t have an artificial super-sweetness to them that some other butterscotch chips do. You can eat them straight out of the bag (which I wouldn’t necessarily recommend with some of the sweeter chip brands) or incorporate them into a favorite recipe. Besides the vanilla, you can easily taste notes of brown sugar/molasses with a hint of dairy in these. They are a pale amber color in the bag and bake up to be a bright orange. Some butterscotch chips I’ve baked with remain hard even after baking, but these soften up fairly quickly in the oven and leave you with a much creamier overall feel – in addition to a good butterscotch flavor – than similar chips of other brands.
Linda
January 11, 2011I also prefer these to the other brands. I look at the ingredients any more to see if “real” cinnamon is in that cinnamon chip or if the package says “artificial flavor” is there another brand that doesn’t or seems to have higher quality ingredients. I think people (besides bakers) can really tell the difference. Good blog.
michelle
January 11, 2011I love the Guittard brand. I use their white chocolate chips because they actually use real cocoa butter. I didn’t realize they made butterscotch chips as well-thanks for the information.
allison
January 15, 2011Awesome for butterscotch pudding or mousse. Instead of chocolate, sub the butterscotch chips. Google “Redwood Park restaurant butterscotch pudding” for a great recipe. I eat half of it straight out of the bowl