September 14, 2018
Butterscotch Cheesecake!
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Creamy and sweet no-bake butterscotch cheesecake with homemade butterscotch sauce!
Butterscotch!
I’ve been waiting and waiting, maybe because I kept on forgetting, to post about butterscotch on my blog. I have always utterly adored the flavour, but for some reason, I am yet to actually post about it on here?! Not sure what happened there, to be honest, but its happening now so we are all good. For those who have requested Butterscotch for ages? I apologise for the wait!
When I was younger I never really understood why there were so many different names for caramel. Toffee? Butterscotch? Surely they are all the same thing?! Well, now I am older I have obviously realised that they are not. However, I know some people also don’t know the difference so here’s the little lesson on all things similar.
Caramel vs toffee vs butterscotch
Caramel is made up of white granulated/caster sugar, cream, butter and vanilla whereas butterscotch is dark brown sugar. Some people wouldn’t realise that the type of sugar can make such a difference, but it does and it’s so important!
Toffee is very similar to butterscotch but is a harder candy-like substance which is cooked for a lot longer. In reality, toffee sauce, and butterscotch sauce when made at home are basically the exact same with different names. The only difference as mentioned is how long its cooked for – I just believe some places call it toffee sauce as its more appealing to younger people.
Recipe
Now, as its basically Autumn (maybe not technically I’m unsure, but I count September as Autumn), I thought this was a better time to post a butterscotch recipe. This recipe does actually contain two though, one for the butterscotch sauce itself, and one for the cheesecake.
You can use shopbought butterscotch, but honestly, once you make it yourself you won’t want shop bought again. It’s five ingredients, so easy to make, and tastes so incredible, whereas shop-bought is average at best. No offence to all the toffee/butterscotch sauce makers out there, obviously!
Cheesecake
The cheesecake is similar to most of my others, because why would you mess with something that isn’t broken. Full-fat cream cheese, icing sugar, vanilla and cream make the best vanilla cheesecake ever, and then adding in butterscotch just elevates it to the next level. Some people would say it would be too sweet, but I don’t actually find butterscotch that bad because of its dark brown sugar, not white sugar.
If you didn’t want to make the sauce at all, you could theoretically use the butterscotch Angel Delight instead. You would basically just need to fold the powder into the mixture, and that would flavour it! I personally didn’t because I much prefer the sauce, but I know some of you love Angel Delight!
Decoration
I decided to decorate this butterscotch cheesecake with an extra drizzle of the butterscotch sauce because why not?! But also some cute little sprinkles, and a toffee on each cream swirl. This is all optional, but I like my cheesecakes to look pretty in their pictures so I always go all out! Enjoy! x
Butterscotch Cheesecake!
Ingredients
Butterscotch Sauce
- 115 g unsalted butter
- 100 g dark brown sugar
- 125 ml double cream
- Pinch of sea salt
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Biscuit Base
- 300 g digestives/Biscoff biscuits
- 150 g unsalted butter (melted)
Cheesecake Filling
- 500 g full-fat cream cheese
- 100 g icing sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 150 g butterscotch sauce (recipe above)
- 300 ml double cream
Decoration
- 150 ml double cream
- 2 tbsp icing sugar
- Butterscotch sauce
- Sprinkles
- Toffee sweets
Instructions
For the Butterscotch Sauce
- Add the Butter to a pan, and melt on a medium heat.
- Add in the sugar, cream and salt and boil for 4-5 minutes on a medium-high heat.
- Take the pan off the heat, and add in the vanilla and stir.
- Transfer to a container to cool fully. It will thicken a bit as it cools.
For the Biscuit Base
- Blitz the biscuits in a food processor until they reach a fine crumb. Alternatively, bash up in a bowl with the end of a rolling pin.
- Add in the melted butter, and press down into the bottom of an 8"/20cm deep springform tin.
For the Cheesecake Filling
- In a large bowl/stand mixer, add your cream cheese, icing sugar, and vanilla and whisk the mixture briefly until smooth.
- Add in your butterscotch sauce and whisk again briefly to combine.
- Finally, add in your double cream and whisk until the mixture is really thick. Whisk for a small amount of time, and check the thickness by folding the mixture with a spatula so as not to overmix.
- Spread the mixture on top of the biscuit base, and refrigerate for 5-6 hours minimum, or preferably overnight for the best set.
For the Decoration
- Whip the double cream and icing sugar together until smooth, thick, and you can pipe with it.
- Drizzle over some butterscotch sauce, and then pipe on your whipped cream.
- Sprinkle over anything you fancy and enjoy!
Notes
- This recipe includes the full recipe you need to make the butterscotch sauce... You only need 150g of the mixture in the cheesecake, so don't pour it all in!
- The butterscotch sauce will last for one month in the fridge but is naturally a bit thicker after being in the fridge and cooling.
- The cheesecake will last for 3 days once made!
- The cheesecake is suitable for freezing!
- I used a mixture of Philadelphia and mascarpone in this particular one, both were full-fat. You can use either you please, it just needs to be full-fat.
- Biscoff biscuits would work wonderfully on the base, I just used digestives as I had them in the cupboard.
- Butterscotch sauce recipe was inspired by Just a Taste!
- I recommend using these 8"/20cm springform tins!
Find my other recipes on my Recipes Page!
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J x
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How long do you leave the caramel to cool for and was it in the fridge when cooling? I want to put it on a cheesecake but don’t want to risk it melting and I would like to keep the drizzle consistency if possible. Also did you use room temperature cream or was the cream straight from the fridge?
Hi, I’m just making this cheesecake. The caramel sauce tastes lovely and is just chilling. What consistency should it be. It’s currently the same as single cream, does that sound right?!
Hey Jane, I’ve had a crack at the butterscotch sauce as I needed this for a totally unrelated recipe but stumbled across yours and it sounded easy, however after the sauce has cooled it has split – Just wondering if this means I didn’t boil for long enough, or too much?
Hiya! Usually this means it has been boiled for too long at too high a temperature x
Hello! If I was to substitute the butterscotch sauce for angel delight how much would you recommended, one sachet? Thank you
Hiya, yesss!x
Hi there ! Just making this with my daughter today. And I tried having a crack at the sauce. And I feel I definitely have overboiled, it. Is there a video of this one I could find ? I tried looking at youtube but couldn’t see anything , please help! Have made it anyway, but it’s pretty much solidified so it’s not viable for a drizzle ;o
Thanks in advance !!
Hey, no unfortunately I don’t have a video on this but I will add it to my list of things to do xx
Hi Jane
I’ve overboiled my butterscotch slightly – it’s pretty thick and not a drizzling consistency now it’s cooled although it’s still liquid not chewable. Is there any way to loosen it up for my drizzle? I’ve used it in the cheesecake and it seems fine, but not sure if I can bring it back slightly.
Thank you!
You could maybe add a little cream to it?! x
Hi Jane!
I’m wanting to make this as individual cheesecakes, probably in muffin cases to take to work. Would this recipe yield 12 do you think? Or maybe more? X
It depends on the sizes of the muffin cases – it would make 12, but maybe a few spare too! x
Mix isn’t getting thick; can I add something to help it set?
Gelatine!
Hi, just a tip/query can you amend your step by step guide to state how much butterscotch goes into the mixture. It wasnt until after I had poured the mixture into the cake and marbled the top I noticed the notes section. It will stop anyone else making the same mistake in future 🙂
It’s already listed in the ingredients that you add 150g of butterscotch sauce to the cheesecake mix.
I made this after using the butterscotch sauce element of your recipe. Used a Biscoff base and it was absolutely delicious, I made it for my brother’s birthday instead of a cake and it disappeared in minutes! Doesn’t look quite as good as yours but it tasted amazing, thanks
I made this & it turned out simply amazing! Not as pretty, but my family& I really liked the butterscotch flavor! It was definitely butterscotch , which is very rich, but the amount you add to cheesecake is just right! I added some chopped pecans with the rest of the sauce drizzled on top . Thank you! Looking forward to making some of your other recipies!
My cheesecake mix doesnt seem to be thickening and it now looks curdled??
That definitely sounds over mixed for sure – it can happen for a few reasons, but depending on how you whisked it (stand/hand/manual) it’s worth trying a different way. Make sure the butterscotch sauce is completely cooled as it can melt the other ingredients, try whipping the cream separately and fold through, and whisk for less time! x
Hi I made this cheesecake last night and the cheesecake mix has gone to a curdled kind of consistency. Taste good just doesn’t look great. What do you think I’ve done wrong?
Just over mixed slightly! It might not set great, but it’s perfectly edible! x
If I want to make the cheesecake in advance how many days will it keep for?
3 days as mentioned in the recipe x
Wow this looks amazing. Can you tell which specific full fat cream cheese do you recommend? How fat my cream cheese should be?
I use full-fat Philadelphia, or Mascarpone!
Thank you for your quick response.
Hi JANE
You say you can freeze the cheesecake does it go runny when it’s defrosted?
Thanks
Hiya! It shouldn’t do! As long as you set it first properly, and then freeze it should stay set once thawed.