These melt in your mouth Butterscotch Shortbread Cookies are everything shortbread should be: buttery, crumbly, lightly sweetened, and totally delicious. This batch makes a bunch so be prepared to share with friends and family. Love shortbread? Make sure to try my Cranberry Orange Shortbread Cookies and Peppermint Shortbread Cookies – so good!
Butterscotch Shortbread
I’m gonna let you in a on a little secret. I made this cookie dough 10 days before I baked it. Not even kidding. Time got away from me and I sort of forgot about it and then happened to notice it one afternoon while I was making up after school snacks for the boys.
Imagine my surprise and delight. It’s not often I find a roll of cookie dough in my fridge just waiting to be baked up.
I love shortbread cookies for that very reason – that you can do 95% of the work in advance and then just slice and bake when you’re ready. Now, I don’t normally wait 10 full days, but, it’s good to know I can if I need to.
I’m always on the hunt for easy cookies that pack a real wow factor and shortbread cookies fit the bill every time.
I love shortbread for so many reasons but one of those reasons is that as a cookie, they are extremely versatile. One of them most popular recipes on my site, year round, is my Cranberry Orange Shortbread Cookies. They use just a handful of ingredients and are truly a one of a kind cookie.
Today, I’m sharing a different method entirely for making shortbread. Instead of cutting in cold butter with a pastry cutter like I do in my other shortbread recipes, this recipe calls for a softened butter.
In order to generate that crumbly, flaky texture that shortbread is known for, some of the flour is subbed out in favor of cornstarch. The other difference you’ll notice is the powdered sugar instead of granulated sugar that I’m using in this recipe. It’s what I use in my snowball cookie recipes (Mint Chocolate Chip Snowball Cookies and Peppermint Snowball Cookies) and I love what it does for the overall texture of the cookie.
Shortbread cookies are one of my favorites because they require just a handful of ingredients, no eggs, and very little time.
What You Need To Make Shortbread Cookies
- all purpose flour
- cornstarch
- salt
- butter
- powdered sugar
- vanilla extract
- butterscotch chips
- toffee bits
Too many shortbread cookies are over-baked resulting in an overly-dry cookie that isn’t easily enjoyed. They really only need about 10 minutes and they’re done. They don’t spread at all so don’t look for that as a sign of doneness.
Make sure to try these cookie favorites!
- Almond Joy Cookies – Just 4 Ingredients!
- Flourless Toffee Peanut Butter Cookies
- Peanut Butter Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Bakery Style M&M’s and Chocolate Chunk Cookies
How To Make Shortbread Cookies
Butterscotch Shortbread Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
- 1/2 cup cornstarch
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 cup butter softened
- 1/2 cup powdered sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2/3 cup butterscotch chips finely chopped
- 1/2 cup toffee bits
Instructions
- In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, cornstarch and salt. Set aside.
- In a large bowl, cream together butter and powdered sugar.
- Mix in vanilla extract.
- Gradually add flour mixture to creamed mixture, stirring to combine.
- Stir in butterscotch chips and toffee bits.
- Place dough on top of a sheet of plastic wrap. Form the dough into a log about 2.5 - 3 inches in diameter. Wrap the log with the plastic wrap and refrigerate dough roll for 1 to 2 hours or until nice and firm.
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Remove plastic wrap from rolls and cut into ¼ inch slices. Place slices about 2 inches apart on cookie sheet.
- Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until lightly browned on the edges. Let cool on baking sheet for 2 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.
Video
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Dianne says
Love this recipe ! Made it many times and people rave about them. Melt in your mouth. Never had any problems making them. Work out perfect for me!
Have you ever tried to freeze the logs, thaw, cut and bake, or cut slices, freeze then bake?. Curious ?
Trish - Mom On Timeout says
I have frozen the logs before! Just thaw in the refrigerator overnight and continue with the recipe. Thank you so much Dianne!
Bridget says
Very good, but pretty fragile, wondering if I cut cornstarch to 1/4 cup, added 1/4 more flour if that would help? I used cinnamon chips (it’s what I had) and the flavor is awesome, thanks!
Trish - Mom On Timeout says
They are crumbly for sure. You can absolutely do as you suggested and it would cut down on that a bit.
CHRISTINE says
TRISH, Thank you for this recipe! So easy to put together! Thanks for the delicious cookies. We devoured them, now I have to make more, lol
Trish - Mom On Timeout says
I’m so glad Christine, thank you!
Jen Deaton says
These are AMAZING cookies. Easy recipe, comes out perfect every time I make them. Thanks for an excellent recipe.
Shery Sullivan says
I can only find milk chocolate toffee bits. Do you think those would work or would it compete with the butterscotch flavor? I also wondered about adding chopped pecans.
Trish - Mom On Timeout says
That should be totally fine and chopped pecans would be great too! You will probably have to work the dough a little more to get everything incorporated.
Donna Goldwasser says
The recipe says to slice the long into 1.5 inch pieces. But when I look at the cookies in the recipe here, they look like they’re about 2.5 to 3 inches in diameter. ? ? ?
How many inches should they be sliced? Thanks! Donna
Trish - Mom On Timeout says
Thank you for catching that! I just recently changed my recipe card software and I think it did a little math problem there. You are absolutely correct!
Martha says
When I took the log out of the refrigerator, they just cut into a pile of crumbs. What is wrong?
Trish - Mom On Timeout says
Oooh! Sounds like the butter wasn’t completely incorporated or there was too much flour. Did you spoon and level your flour or scoop it with a measuring cup? Scooping can lead to a lot of excess flour.
Debby Sire says
I have so enjoyed many of the recipes I’ve found here. But, I’m having a hard time figuring out where the “total time” listed comes from. Math was never my strong suit, but even I know that if I have to chill the dough for 1 hour, that adds 1 hour somewhere in the prep time. To me the the total time for this recipe should be 1 hour, 20 minutes. I’ve seen where dough needs to be chilled on several recipes and this chill time really should be figured into the total time.
Trish - Mom On Timeout says
I agree with you Debby but I just pop the numbers in and I think what the plugin does and compute active working time. Hope that helps!