I’m not sure if its the weather, or what, but I’ve been craving buttertarts for the past few days. After a couple of days of trying to ignore it, I figured I would go ahead and make them — justifying it by making the crust with whole grain flour.
I may have blogged before about the SaltSpring Mills flour, but here I go again — they have a small mill on SaltSpring Island, and mill up red-fife flour, and a “white” red-fife flour which I have found works great for pastry and as a substitute for while flour. Its actually a soft wheat, light in colour, and low in gluten, so it has great mild, whole-grain flavour, but doesn’t get overly tough. Since finding this, I use unbleached white flour a lot less than I used to, and I find this, and the red-fife bread flour are the freshest I have found short of milling my own flour!
For any of you reading from the US, buttertarts are a uniquely Canadian invention (who says ingenuity can’t come from a long, cold, dark, winter!!!). There are a few “musts” in my books for the perfect buttertart:
- Lots of flaky, unsweetened pastry to counter the super sweet filling:
- Pastry HAS to be homemade (sorry to those of you who use pre-made tart shells). There is a certain shape to a buttertart, that only comes from making your own tart shells in a muffin tin: Cylindrical, solid and dependable looking! And the pastry is much flakier when you make your own.
- Real butter in the filling.
- Raisins (yes, I know folks have come to blows over the raisins vs. currants debate, but I’m a raisin kind of guy!) and NOT nuts!!!
- A filling that is gooey and only very slightly runny (again, many mild-mannered Canadian folks have come to blows over this, but I like ‘em a little on the gooier side)
- A little crust formed on the top of the filling from the crystallization of the sugars in the filling
- Not too big — these puppies are sweet, after all!
Finally, the other other ritual buttertart moment is the removing of the buttertarts from the pan — will they stick?!? will they come out in one piece? Its hard to wait (which you have to do!) until they are cooled off enough, and even then, if you’ve made the pastry right, it will *just* hold together enough to encapsulate the filling. You have to do this gently, coaxing these little morsels out of the tin. Be patient, and all will be well!
All of this makes for a buttertart that you can eat in 3-4 bites, but for which you have to adopt the “buttertart stance” — legs apart, head slightly forward, elbow up, aaand, enjoy!
This recipe was courtesy of Anna Olsen’s show Sugar, and is one I’ve used quite a bit over the past couple of years. I like the flavour of the added maple syrup, and find it also keeps the texture of the filling nice and soft and gooey. The original recipe also had caramel sauce on top, but I think that’s a little like gilding the lily!
Maple Buttertarts:
Crust
- 2 1/4 cups pastry flour (I used Salt Spring Mills “white” red-fife flour)
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 3/4 cup lard or vegetable shortening
- 1 tsp lemon juice
- 1 egg
- 3 to 4 tbsp cold water (as needed)
Filling
- 1 cup dried currants (I used raisins)
- 1/2 cup hot water
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1/2 cup dark brown sugar, packed
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 tsp white vinegar
- dash cinnamon (I subbed out ground coriander, just because I like it better!)
- 1/4 cup corn syrup
- 1/2 cup maple syrup
Bake at 375 degrees for 20 minutes.
Hi – I, too, have been craving butter tarts! thank you for the recipe – now where to find the Salt Spring red fife flour?
if you are in victoria, planet organic carries the saltspring mills line of flours