Butter Tarts, Canada’s Humble Favorite, Have Much to Love (Published 2018) (2024)

FAQs

Why are butter tarts famous in Canada? ›

Like many legendary dishes, the butter tart's origins are fuzzy. It's believed that filles à marier (“marriageable girls”) created a crude version in the 1600s. These newly arrived Québécois brides filled their French tarts with New World ingredients: maple sugar, freshly churned butter and dried fruit such as raisins.

The earliest-known published recipe for butter tarts has been traced back to Simcoe County and, specifically, to the cookbook published by the Women's Auxiliary of Royal Victoria Hospital in 1900.

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

In 2019, more than 200,000 butter tarts were sold, a number Mealing expects to at least match this year.

Milk-fat production

Canadian recipe writer Julie Van Rosendaal subsequently suggested that dairy farmers may have increased their use of palm oil in dairy cattle's diet, increasing the hardness of the milk fat they produced.

Butter tarts are a quintessential Canadian dessert—and, oh, how I love them! 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.

Butter Tarts should be stored in an airtight container and refrigerated, they will keep for up to five days in the fridge. If you keep them at room temperature remember they will only keep for about a day or 2 depending on how warm your home is. To freeze, place them in an airtight freezer container.

Butter tarts are indeed a popular Canadian pastery. The phrase butter tart, as used in the song, is also slang for a woman's parts.

With a gooey, just-set filling made with butter, brown sugar, maple syrup, and eggs, butter tarts are hard not to love. They have comforting notes of caramel and butterscotch and are perfect when you want something small and sweet.

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. It may take a couple tries to perfect your butter tart, and that's totally OK!

Why do my butter tarts boil over? ›

Butter tarts most often boil over because they were filled too full before baking. Try to only fill each tart 2/3 full with filling so there's plenty of room for bubbling and expansion.

Purists say true butter tarts should not contain raisins or nuts. For Currie and March of Wasaga Beach, Ont., they have to have raisins. Some like runny fillings, some firm. Some like thick pastry shells while others like thin so the filling stars.

Supply issues are also largely responsible for pushing up butter prices. Many dairy farmers significantly thinned their herds after struggling financially during the coronavirus pandemic, said Peter Vitaliano, chief economist at the National Milk Producers Federation.

The Portuguese egg tart was invented thanks to monks and laundry. With its distinctive caramelized, creme brulee-like topping, pastéis de nata are arguably Portugal's favorite dessert. They were supposedly first made in the 13th century by monks in the Jerónimos Monastery in Lisbon.

A butter tart is a small pastry tart, which generally consists of butter, sugar, syrup, and egg, filled into a flaky pastry and baked until the filling is semi-solid with a crunchy top. The first published recipe came in 1900 with The Women's Auxiliary of the Royal Victoria Hospital Cookbook.

It starts with Canadian milk

The best butter comes from naturally delicious milk. It's collected at the farm and brought to the creamery.