Butterscotch Pudding Day

What the day is

Butterscotch Pudding Day is observed on September 19. It celebrates a stovetop custard built on brown sugar and butter, cooked until thick and served cold. Butterscotch rarely wins a popularity contest against chocolate or vanilla, which is much of the point of giving it a day.

The flavor comes from brown sugar cooked with butter until the sugar darkens. That is the practical line between butterscotch and caramel: caramel starts with white sugar, butterscotch with brown, and the molasses in brown sugar is what gives butterscotch its deeper, slightly salty edge. A pinch of salt and a spoonful of vanilla added off the heat sharpen it further.

Origin and background

The origin of the observance is not documented, and no founder or sponsoring organization is reliably known. It is one of a long run of single-dessert days on the American calendar, most of which appeared without announcement.

Butterscotch as a confection is older and better attested, associated with Yorkshire in the nineteenth century and sold first as a hard sweet rather than a pudding. The pudding version belongs to the era of packaged mixes: boxed butterscotch pudding became a supermarket staple in the mid-twentieth century, which is how most people first met the flavor. Anyone who only knows it from a box is likely to be surprised by the homemade version, which tastes markedly less like artificial flavoring and more like cooked sugar.

How to take part

Making it from scratch takes about fifteen minutes of actual work and needs no special equipment.

• Melt butter with dark brown sugar and cook briefly until it smells nutty, then whisk in milk or cream.
• Temper the eggs: add a little hot mixture to the beaten yolks first, then return everything to the pan, or the eggs will scramble.
• Cook gently until it coats a spoon, then strain it. Straining catches any set egg and is the difference between silky and grainy.
• Press plastic wrap directly onto the surface before chilling if you dislike the skin that otherwise forms.

Serve it cold with lightly whipped cream, or with something crisp against the softness: shortbread, toasted pecans, or a scatter of flaky salt. Boxed mix is a legitimate shortcut, and on a Tuesday it is the sensible one.