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Beer (Quebec, spruce) • ice cider • Newfoundland Screech • whisky • wine (British Columbia, ice wine, Ontario, Prince Edward County, Quebec) |
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Ingredients
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Styles & dishes
Bûche de Noël • butter tart • donair • figgy duff • flapper pie • fried dough • Montreal (bagel, smoked meat) • Oreilles de crisse • Peameal bacon • pierogi • Pizza-ghetti • Pouding chômeur • Poutine • St. Catherine's taffy • Tourtière |
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A butter tart is a type of small pastry tart highly regarded in Canadian cuisine and considered one of Canada's quintessential desserts. The tart consists of butter, sugar, syrup, and egg filled into a flaky pastry and baked until the filling is semi-solid with a crunchy top.[1]
The butter tart should not be confused with butter pie (a savoury pie from the Preston area of Lancashire, England) or with bread and butter pudding.
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Recipes for the butter tart vary according to the families baking them. Because of this, the appearance and physical characteristics of the butter tart – the firmness of its pastry, or the softness of its filling – also varies.[2][3]
In general, 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 pecan pie in that it has a creamier filling due to the omission of corn starch. Raisins are in the traditional butter tart, but walnuts, or pecans are commonly added. However purists contend that such additions should not be allowed.[2]
Other additional ingredients may include currants, coconut, dates, butterscotch, chocolate chips, peanut butter, maple syrup or chai.[4]
Butter tarts were common in pioneer Canadian cooking, and they remain a characteristic pastry of Canada, considered one of only a few recipes of genuinely Canadian origin (for example, by the 6th edition of the Collins English Dictionary). It is primarily eaten and associated with the English-speaking provinces of Canada. However the origins of the tart, its name, and its recipe are unclear[1]. Some suggested pastries with similar origins to the butter tart include:[1]
The earliest published Canadian recipe is from Barrie, Ontario dating back to 1900 and can be found in The Women’s Auxiliary of the Royal Victoria Hospital Cookbook.[5] Another early publication of a butter tart recipe was found in a 1915 pie cookbook.[1] The food was an integral part of early Canadian cuisine and often viewed as a source of pride.[5]
Similar tarts are made in Scotland, where they are often referred to as Ecclefechan butter tarts from the town of Ecclefechan. In France, they are related to the much more common tarte à la frangipane, that differs from the basic Canadian recipe only by the addition of ground almonds.
A typical recipe of Butter tarts has the following nutrition facts per serving (around 100g):[6]
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