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Sea Salt Pretzel Butterscotch Cookies
Sea Salt Butterscotch Pretzel Cookies made with brown butter, sweet butterscotch chips, semi-sweet chocolate chips, and salty pretzel pieces. It is the epitome of a sweet and salty cookie. I mean….the crunchy pretzels put these over the top.
I remember the very first time I tried to make cookies with brown butter. We were living in the very first home we built and had two young kids. I made cookies all of the time but didn’t own a Kitchenaid at the time. Cookie dough made in one saucepan sounded like the most genius idea.
What I wasn’t prepared for was the toffee and caramel notes in the cookie that came with just one simple step — browning the butter. It tasted like such a richer and more decadent cookie without adding a ridiculous amount of brown sugar and butter. The method completely changed the flavor of the cookie. I was hooked!
Now, here’s the thing. Brown Butter can be a tad finicky. You want it to have time to develop those deep caramel flavors; yet, you don’t want to let too much moisture evaporate from the butter. Tricky. I have found that I don’t cook it long enough to get to that super deep color because by then you have lost a lot of the moisture. Instead, I cook it long enough for the butter to melt and to develop some richness.
This Sea Salt Butterscotch Pretzel Cookie uses melted brown butter that is cooled for about 20-25 minutes before adding the rest of the ingredients. This is to ensure that you don’t end up with scrambled eggs! Adding eggs to hot butter is rarely ever a good idea when making cookie dough. The brown sugar and sugar is added to the melted butter.
This is when your muscles come in! Stir vigorously with a wooden spoon until the mixture becomes velvety smooth. If it isn’t smooth like butter, add the egg, egg yolk, and vanilla and keep on stirring. Let the magic happen!
The dry ingredients are next and then the GOOD stuff — the butterscotch chips, chocolate chips, and chopped salty pretzels. This is when you want to ensure that your dough is at room temp. If it’s crazy hot, you are going to end up with melted swirls of butterscotch and chocolate throughout your cookie. It may taste heavenly but not the look we are going for.
After the Sea Salt Butterscotch Pretzel Cookie dough has been made and you have stopped sneaking tastes from the pan (I see you) then wrap it in saran wrap and place the dough in the refrigerator to chill. Is chilling ever a bad thing? The answer is always no.
If you want to go the lazy route (I am not judging), tightly cover the pan and place in the refrigerator to chill. Patience is a virtue. Wait for 15 – 20 minutes at the very least.
After the dough is nice and chilled, drop the dough onto parchment or silpat lined baking sheets. Here are a few of my favorite tools in the kitchen —
Medium Cookie Scoopand
silicone baking sheetsare a must.
Bake until the cookies start to become slightly golden brown on the edges, so you get those crisp edges but still look a little underdone in the center. Remove from oven and let sit for a few minutes before devouring them. That is what you will want to do with these Sea Salt Butterscotch Pretzel Cookies. I promise you that.
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Sea Salt Butterscotch Pretzel Cookies
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 cup Butter
- 1 1/4 cup Brown Sugar
- 1/4 cup Sugar
- 1 Egg
- 1 Egg Yolk
- 1 Tablespoon Vanilla
- 2 1/4 cup Flour
- 1 teaspoon Baking Soda
- 1 teaspoon Sea Salt
- 3/4 cup Butterscotch Chips
- 1/2 cup Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips
- 1 cup Pretzels chopped
- Sea Salt optional to sprinkle on top
Instructions
- In a medium saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat. Bring it to a slow rolling boil. Stir until butter starts to become a light amber or deep gold color. Watch carefully as it can burn. Remove from heat.
- Let butter cool for 15 – 20 minutes.
- Preheat the oven to 350°F.
- Stir in the brown sugar, sugar, eggs, and vanilla into the cooled butter mixture. Stir to combine. Add flour, baking soda, and salt. Fold all ingredients together.
- Stir in butterscotch chips, chocolate chips, and pretzels.
- Drop the dough on the baking sheet. Bake for 9 – 13 minutes, or until the edges become lightly golden.
- If desired sprinkle with a pinch of flaked sea salt on top of the cookies.
- *Adapted from Cookies and Cups Recipe
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
These Sea Salt Butterscotch Pretzel Cookies are the perfect balance of sweet and salty and will be one of your favorites in no time at all! Happy Baking, my friends! xo
This is absolutely the BEST cookie recipe… ever! Mine came out a bit flatter than yours, but the flavor is amazing!!
SO yummy! My dough was a bit crumbly after I combined all the ingredients, is that okay?
Can you use sugar free pudding mix?
I made these a couple days ago and They. Are. Ridiculous. SO GOOD
These cookies were AMAZING! Everyone in my family was complimentary of them, and they ate the entire batch! They want more! They are the perfect mix of salty and sweet with a fun pretzel crunch!
My dough was too crumbly. I couldn’t form a ball.
I added extra butter and a little milk. Great ingredients but, I think too much flour.
These are one of our favorites! So good every time!
These cookies have blown us away! I should have made two batches as we ate them in one day!! So yummy!!
I need to make 6 dozen (triple batch) of these cookies for a Cookie Exchange party this weekend. Can I make the dough ahead of time (say Thursday night) and the scoop out and bake the cookies Saturday morning? Are there any other considerations when tripling this recipe? Thanks!
Hi Tracey! You can absolutely make the dough on Thursday and bake on Saturday. Cookie dough just gets better with time. I like to chill my dough for 24-48 hours because it makes all cookies so much better.
A few things to keep in mind…the dough may be slightly crumbly. Anytime you chill dough, the dry ingredients absorb the wet ingredients and the dough becomes more cohesive. Don’t worry a bit of it’s crumbly. Just use your hands to bring it all together and let the dough come to room temperature.
I haven’t tried this particular dough for a full 48 hours so the pretzels could lose a little of their crunch. It may not be a big deal but if you want to add the pretzels to the top of the cookies as you are shaping them, then you can ensure they stay crunchy. I hope that helps! Thanks for trying the recipe. — Melissa
My entire family loved these. We have super picky eaters and one who doesn’t even like sweets. I knew butterscotch was a risk but I did it anyway. I made them with gluten free flour and gluten free pretzels and they turned out great! I did let my dough warm up and then I used my hands to form it. The scooper made a mess and that helped the crumble!!
I am so glad your family loved these cookies! Thank you for sharing your gluten-free swaps and sharing how they turned out. I appreciate you taking the time to comment.
These are everything. Literally everything. That I love. Cannot WAIT to try this out!