Last updated on June 12th, 2025.
When you’re in the mood for something chewy, sweet, and totally comforting, Oatmeal Butterscotch Cookies hit the spot. They’re a fun spin on the classic oatmeal cookie—packed with hearty oats and melty, buttery butterscotch chips in every bite. If soft and chewy cookies are your thing, you’re gonna love these!
Oatmeal Butterscotch Cookies are a fun twist on the classic—chewy from the oats and packed with sweet, caramel-like butterscotch chips. They’ve got that perfect mix of texture and flavor, and they’re always a hit. These aren’t your typical oatmeal scotchies either—they bake up thin with crispy, golden edges and a bold butterscotch taste. They’ve become a family favorite around here, just like my Butterscotch Blondies. And if you’re into cookies, don’t miss my Chocolate Chunk Cookies or Coffee Cookies too!
Key Ingredients
The complete recipe is at the bottom of this post in the recipe card, here is a quick description of the key ingredients.
- Unsalted Butter (softened) – The base of any good cookie! Butter gives richness, moisture, and helps create those golden, slightly crisp edges. To use salted butter, make sure not to add the salt.
- Granulated Sugar – Adds sweetness and helps the cookies spread just the right amount.
- Light & Dark Brown Sugar – This combo is key! It deepens the butterscotch flavor and gives the cookies their signature chewy texture thanks to the molasses content.
- Vanilla Extract – A splash of vanilla rounds out the flavors and adds a cozy depth.
- All-Purpose Flour + Cake Flour – Using both gives you the best of both worlds: structure from the AP flour and a tender, soft bite from the cake flour.
- Baking Soda – In this recipe, the baking soda helps the cookies spread and get their beautiful dark golden color.
- Old-Fashioned Oats – These bring that hearty, chewy texture. Be sure to use old-fashioned oats, not quick or rolled oats, for the right bite. Do not use quick oats, it will not work in this recipe.
- Butterscotch Chips – The star of the show! These melt into gooey pockets of sweet, buttery flavor throughout the cookie. If butterscotch chips are not available to you, know that brown sugar also helps with the flavor of the cookies, you can substitute the chips with caramel chips, chocolate chips, or chopped nuts.
Make It
These chewy oatmeal cookies can be made using a stand mixer, or a hand mixer.
- Spread the oat over a pan lined with parchment paper and bake for 5 minutes. Ground two tablespoons to a fine powder. In a medium bowl mix the oats, oat powder, flour, salt, and baking soda.
- In a large bowl, beat the butter, and sugar until light and airy.
- Add the egg and vanilla and mix to blend.
- Mix in the dry ingredients followed by the butterscotch chips.
- Scoop 4 cookie dough balls space them over the cookie sheet and bake.
- Mid-baking, remove the cookies and use a large cookie cutter to swirl the cookies and shape them. Repeat post baking.
Tips
- Make sure all of the ingredients are at room temperature.
- The large amount of butter and sugar and the low amount of flour are why these cookies spread three times their raw size. If you prefer them chubbier, increase the amount of all-purpose flour by 1 cup.
- Use a medium-sized cookie scoop (1 1/2 tablespoons)
- You can add a hint of cinnamon or a dash of nutmeg for extra flavor.
- Don’t overcrowd the baking sheet to ensure even cooking.
- Allow the baked cookies to set before inverting them to a wire rack.
Storing and Freezing
To keep your Oatmeal Butterscotch Cookies fresh, store them in an airtight container at room temperature for up to a week. To freeze, place the baked and cooled cookies in an airtight container or zip-top bag, and they will keep well for up to eight weeks. Thaw at room temperature when you’re ready to enjoy them.
More Cookies Recipes You Might Enjoy
Triple Chocolate Chip Cookies, Butter Meringue Cookies, Popcorn Cookies
Oatmeal Butterscotch Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 Cup +2 TBS Old Fashion Oats (90 g / 3 oz)
- 1 Cup Unsalted butter softened (226 g / 8 oz)
- 1/2 Cup Sugar (100 g / 3.5 oz)
- 1/2 Cup Light brown sugar (100 g / 3.5 oz)
- 1/2 Cup Dark Brown Sugar (100 g / 3.5 oz)
- 1 tsp Vanilla extract
- 1 Large Egg, room temperature
- 1/2 Cup Cake flour (60 g / 2 oz)
- 1/2 Cup All-purpose Flour (60 g / 2 oz)
- 1 1/2 tsp Baking soda
- 1 tsp Kosher salt
- 1 tsp Sea salt flakes
- 1 Cup Butterscotch chips (180 g / 6 oz)
Instructions
- Heat oven to 350F and line 3 half-sheet cookie pans with parchment paper.
- Spread the oat on one of the pans and bake for 5 minutes. Remove from oven and allow to cool
- In a spice grinder or a food processor, grind 2 TBS of the baked oat into a fine powder.
- In a bowl of a standing mixer, beat butter and sugars until fluffy and light in color about 4-5 minutes. Stop the mixer halfway and scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl.
- In a small bowl, beat the egg and vanilla extract together then add it to the butter mixture.
- Stop the mixer and scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl, mix for another 10 seconds.
- In a large bowl, mix the flour, baking soda, salts, oats, and powdered oats use a fork to fully blend then add the butterscotch and toss to make sure all have been coated with flour.
- Add the flour mix to the butter mix, beat for 5 seconds turn the mixer off, and finish mixing using a rubber spatula.
- Using a cookies spoon (1 1/2 TBS size) scoop the cookie batter and place 4 cookies on a cookie sheet, leaving 2-3" space between each cookie.
- Reduce oven temperature to 340F (160C).
- Place pan in the middle oven rack and bake for 8 minutes. Remove from the oven tap the pan against the counter, and use a large cookie cutter to gently twirl the cookie and make it round.
- Place the pan back in the oven and bake for another 4-6 minutes.
- Remove from the oven and twirl the cookies again with the cookie cutter. Allow cookies to cool before removing from the oven.
- Repeat with the remaining of the dough.
Notes
- Make sure all of the ingredients are at room temperature.
- The cookies spread to very thin cookies, for thicker cookies, increase the all-purpose cookies by one to one and a half cups.
- If you like add to the flour mixture a hint of cinnamon or nutmeg.
- Store the cookies at room temperature for up to three days.
- To freeze, place the cookies in a freeze bag and freeze for up to eight weeks. Allow the cookies to reach room temperature out side of the bag.
These look SOOOOOO good! Yummy 🙂
These are SOOOOOO Good!!!
Do you mean let them cool before removing them from the pan? Don’t leave in the oven right? Also it’s like 77 in my house….. summer so they were pretty melted dough should I chill it at all?
Hi Kristin,
Yes, I mean let cool in the pan after removing from the oven. Once out of the oven, the cookies are very soft, and moving them right away might tear the cookies, just make sure they are hard for the most part and can be safely moved to the cooling rack. For me, it was about 10 minutes after taking out of the oven.
Can the baked cookies be frozen? I’m trying to get a head start on Christmas baking.
I never tried to freeze these ones. I think they might lose some of their crispiness but will keep their flavor.
Go ahead and freeze the dough. Just let it fully come to room temperature before you preheat your oven and bake them.
Hi I can’t get butterscotch chips here. Can I change it with something else? Or how 1st o u make it?
You can use chocolate chips or white chocolate chips. You will still have the butterscotch flavors coming from the brown sugar but not as much.
We call these oatmeal scotchies in Ohio and these are my favorite!! Can’t wait to try this one!
thank you so much LouAnn!!
I just made these, and they are so good! I thought it was a lot of salt in the recipe, but it’s the perfect balance of sweet and salty. Also love the rounding technique, I can definitely use that for other cookie recipes. My boys tasted them right after they cooled down and loved them too! I like that they are crispy but you still have the chewiness from the oats. I wonder if they will stay crispy with the humidity here in Manila? Will find out tomorrow!
thank you so much Noel! so glad you liked the cookies!
Over the years, my husband has frequently reminisced about the thin, crispy, and chewy oatmeal scotchies cookies he remembered eating in his childhood, but every time I tried to make them, according to the butterscotch morsel package recipe, they were a disappointment; thick, plump, with no crisp, no chew, with no lingering buttery, salty sweetness that he dreamt about since his youth. He never complained of course, but I knew he was being polite when he ate just a few, saving the rest “for the grandkids”. Let me tell you, with this recipe, I nailed it!! Finally! He ate nearly the entire stack of huge, round, perfect cookies, caring less whether the grandchildren got a single bite! Thank you so much! He felt so special that I took the time to find the recipe for his favorite childhood treat. It is a keeper for sure and will likely be the only cookies I bake on a regular basis. They are just perfect.
Thank you so much Cindi for taking the time to write this comment, it made my week!!!!
So happy to hear your husband loved the cookies so much and that they made him feel special. He is one lucky man to have you, sounds like you have been searching for this special recipe for him for years now.
Baking is a love language for sure!
Well these are perfect cookies. Salty/sweet, crispy/chewy,
and they go great with cold milk. I didn’t round off my first batch and they really didn’t get wonky, so I just left them as-is. Didn’t matter because my kids inhaled them. So, so delicious. I’m in the middle of making my second batch and my 8 year old said, “you should make these again!” Lol.
That is amazing Steph!
I agree, these cookies are good no matter what they look like, LOL. Thank you for sharing.
I have 2 questions 1) Can someone please explain to me how to twirl the cookies with a cookie cutter to make them round. I don’t understand what I’m supposed to do. 2) Do you have to use both AP flour and cake flour or can you use all AP flour? These sound amazing and I would love to make them but don’t have cake flour but would be willing to get some if necessary to get good results. Also, before I risk ruining a bunch of ingredients I really need to understand what cookie cutter I need and how to round the cookies.
Hi Kandy,
the cookies tend to spread a lot and sometimes into an unpleased shape. The cookie cutter helps give the cookies a uniform symmetric shape. What I do is place the cookie cutter around the cookies, and then move it in circles with the cookie at the center, until they are symmetric. If the cookies are too big, I like to push the edges toward to center using the cutter. The cake flour is wha helps the cookies get a crispy texture, but if you do not have any, add 2 teaspoons of potato starch to the flour. Hope this helps let me know if you have any more questions.
These are wonderful! Used some to make ice cream sandwiches 🙂
I have tried these cookies twice & they seem to be too oily. I don’t know if I should cut the butter in half or not.
That is how the cookies are, as they set, they feel less oily. You can cut the butter in half, but they won’t spread as much.
This looks so good! What a great combination of flavors!
Where can I find such a large cookie cutter? My husband loved them but they were really too thin. I know the cookie cutter would help and also your video was great, but I couldn’t get it to play. I just saw pieces at a time.
You can scoop smaller sough balls, or use the cookie cutter to push the edges towards tbe center in parts.
It won’t be as symmetrical but it will do the job.