It’s that time of year when my thoughts turn to how fast summertime went and all the while trying to enjoy this beautiful fall weather. Baking traditional Canadian desserts is one of my families “must haves” at this time of year. Butter tarts first came to Canada in the early 1900’s from France. Growing up in Canada, we had butter tarts every holiday season, with some for special occasions throughout the year.

Directions and pictures

To make butter tarts you will need a mini or regular muffin tin, two mixing bowls, a whisk, a fork, measuring cups, measuring spoons, and a rolling pin.

Filling

The ingredients you will need for the filling are ½ cup of brown sugar, two tablespoons of vanilla (intimidation vanilla works), ¼ cup of butter, and two eggs. 

Crust

½ pound or 1 ⅛ cup of shortening (butter or lard will work also), two cups of all purpose flour, and ½ cup of water is need for the crust of the butter tart.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Mix together brown sugar, butter, eggs, and vanilla until butter chunks are gone and brown sugar is dissolved, to make a foamy filling. Set aside.

In a separate bowl combine flour and shortening with a fork or pastry blender until contents becomes a crumbly mixture.

Add water and mix until mixture becomes a soft dough.

Get surface ready to roll out dough by dusting with flour.

Roll out dough until it is about ⅛ inch thick.

Using the edge of a ⅓ cup for mini tarts and the edge of a 1 cup for larger tart cut out circles of dough and place into muffin tins.

With muffin tins prepared, use a tablespoon scoop 1 tbsp. of filling into the mini tarts and 2-2 ½ tbsp into the regular tarts.

Once all tarts are filled with the filling, place into oven for 15-20 minutes or until the filling starts to bubble.

Let tarts cool for ten minutes before removing from the muffin tins and cooling completely on a cooling rack.

The best way to serve a butter tart is with a warm cup of coffee, and a room full of family and friends. If you enjoy getting new recipes, reading gardening tips and tricks, and following my journey as a small flower farmer, subscribe to my blog midwestcutflowers.com and follow me on pinterest and instagram. Try not to FALL for this amazing treat, they are sure the LEAF you smiling!