The Best Classic Canadian Butter Tarts - a definite keeper recipe! (2024)

FAQs

Should butter tarts have raisins? ›

Prepare the add-ins, pecans and raisins. No worries if they're not to your taste, they're optional, so just skip ahead! Whisk up the distinctive filling made with butter, sugars, eggs and a few additional flavour boosters. Fill the chilled tart shells and bake.

If your butter tarts unfortunately turn out too soggy, it's likely your filling was too watered down or your pastry was rolled too thin. Next time, make sure your pastry is only rolled out to a 1/4-inch-thickness.

The History Of The Butter Tart

' Butter tarts were common in Canadian pioneer cooking. The earliest published recipe for a butter tart is from Barrie, Ontario dating back to 1900 in the Women's Auxiliary of the Royal Victoria Hospital Cookbook. Another early published recipe was found in a 1915 pie cookbook.

To stop tarts from boiling over, line each muffin cup so that the pastry comes about 1/2″ above the tin, says Nancy Coady, owner of Betty's Pies and Tarts in Cobourg, Ont. If you use an electric mixer to combine ingredients, start on the lowest setting. Overmixing can add air to the filling, causing it to bubble.

Get this item with your grocery order. Our Butter Tart mix strikes all the right notes of sticky and buttery sweetness while remaining convenient to prepare. With no artificial flavours or colours, simply add water and butter to the mix, cook and stir on your stove top for 10 minutes.

You could be forgiven if you've never eaten a butter tart. There is no flashy frosting or elaborate lattice to entice you. It's easy to pass by. But Canadians will tell you that these diminutive treats hold an expanse of flavor and textures: flaky pastry, caramelized crust and a bracingly sweet filling.

Blind Bake the Crust

One of the fool-proof ways to ensure a crisp bottom pie crust is to do what is called blind baking. This simply means that you bake the crust—either fully if you are adding a custard or cream that won't be cooked, or partially if the whole pie needs to bake—before adding the filling.

When making a pie or tart there is no need to grease the tin before you line it with pastry – the high butter content in the pastry will naturally stop it from sticking to the tin.

These buttery mini pies, typically baked in a muffin tin, have a flaky crust filled with a gooey mixture of butter, sugar, syrup, egg, and sometimes raisins or nuts. They bear some resemblance to the American pecan pie and British treacle tart, but their uniquely rich flavor sets them apart.

Does America have butter tarts? Yes, any decent bakery will typically carry butter tarts, that quintessential Canadian pastry.

Who made the first butter tart? ›

According to the Canadian Encyclopedia, butter tarts are a result of the filles du roi, or the King's Daughters, who were young French women sent to Quebec in the 17th century.

If the bottom crust doesn't set before the filling soaks in, it's going to be gummy. A metal pie pan placed on a preheated surface will set the bottom crust quickest; once cooked, the liquids from the filling above won't soak in, and as a result: no soggy bottom.

-- To avoid "gritty" butter tarts, caramelize sugar first by blending on the stovetop with butter, syrup and vanilla. Let it cool before adding eggs to the mixture or they'll be scrambled.

If you stir the filling too much, the eggs will hold air. That air rises in the oven causing the filling to puff up, then sinks in the center when the tarts are removed from the oven.

Traditionally, the English Canadian tart consists of butter, sugar, and eggs in a pastry shell, similar to the French-Canadian sugar pie, or the base of the U.S. pecan pie without the nut topping. The butter tart is different from the sugar pie given the lack of flour in the filling.

Ingredients. Pastry: Flour, Non-hydrogenated Vegetable Shortening, Eggs, Brown Sugar, Salt. Filling: Corn Syrup, Brown Sugar, Non-hydrogenated Margarine (soy), Eggs, Butter, Salt, Pure Vanilla Extract. Contains Statement: Wheat, Eggs, Soy, Dairy.

Holes in the dough will cause the filling to seep under the pastry, causing the tarts to stick to the pan. Toasting Nuts: You don't have to toast nuts when making butter tarts; they toast as the tarts bake in the oven.