welcome friends it is Sunday morning so we're going to do another one of our
Depression era pre-world War two recipes from the Elmvale community cookbook
this was printed in 1939 and today's recipe is a little bit special because
it signals the start of a separate series that we're going to do on the
channel all about butter tarts and I realize that nine years ago we did a
butter tart recipe video and we said on that one we're gonna do a series
exploring the butter tart the history and and all of the different variations
and then for some reason we didn't follow through what we're gonna do it
and we're gonna start today so today's butter tart recipe is
courtesy of mrs. George egg Johnston and it starts out with brown sugar butter
charts are they're uniquely Canadian thing they're actually probably uniquely
Ontario you don't see them a lot in Western Canada or at least in the past
you didn't see them a lot in Western Canada this is something that is pretty
much Ontario and maybe a little bit into the Maritimes and it is essentially
derived from a bunch of different recipes that would have been brought to
Canada over the years one of the most obvious is Tarte au soup which is a kid
a qua that is just sugar pie essentially is what the translation is sugar pie
and it kind of looks a little bit like a Bakewell tart except it's not a Bakewell
tart and it kind of looks a little bit like pecan pie but it's not pecan pie
and it's one of those recipes that everyone has a favorite everyone knows
what is best and so there are many many variations there's variations on what
kind of sugar you use there's variations on whether there's milk or cream in them
this one has cream there are variations on how many eggs you use there are
variations on whether you like it gooey and runny or whether you like a
firm texture in the middle there are variations on whether it has currants or
raisins or walnuts and people are absolutely adamant that their way is the
only way and I'm I'm pretty much like that - I mean I won't turn down a butter
chart if someone hands me one that isn't quite the way that I like it but you
know if I'm making them at home I want them the way that I want them and I got
to tell you mrs. George Johnston this is not the way I would make a butter tart
but I'm gonna give it a try because I want to try the recipe you always have
to try new things so as far as sugar goes this one uses brown sugar the first
known written recipe of a butter tart called a butter tart used white sugar I
see a lot of recipes that use maple syrup I see a lot of recipes that use
corn syrup either light corn syrup or dark corn syrup raisins currants the
options are endless everyone's right and everyone's wrong now are this calls for
seedless raisins put those in and chopped walnuts put those in as well and
we'll just mix them here is the next thing I think everybody agrees the
pastry has to be handmade it has to be handmade has to be hand formed if you're
buying a butter tart in a what looks like a machine made pastry casing no
everyone agrees that's wrong so just like most of these recipes from the
community cookbooks this early she doesn't say how many tarts it fills and
it doesn't say how to bake them or how long to bake them it just says to fill
the tart shells and bake them so I'm gonna start it with 12 and I'm gonna see
what happens these are the kind of thing that you really want to fill carefully
and you don't want to get this filling everywhere because it will stick and
burn and just be a mess so be very careful
so we filled 12 standard muffin cups I'm gonna stick these in the oven and let's
see what happens so once again I've come in at the end of the day and you have
many things on the go which is always fun so these are well I you know what
they are yes they're some of the ugliest butter
toys are ever seen I don't think you uh Thank You Julie no I I was just saying I
I completely screwed up I knew that what I was filling them I was over filling
them and I'm thinking I don't remember how I know that you only have to go like
three quarters of the way but I overfilled them so I'm just having one
of those moments you overfilled about having these women look at who made them
mrs. I know mrs. George Johnson you know mrs. George Johnson yeah she speaks to
you yeah cool well this is her interpretation of a
butter cart so so other than our technical error they look pretty good
the they do so she doesn't say what kind of pastry to use okay so I didn't know
whether you use butter or lard here I'm gonna do tests so this is the test are
they runny or are they stiff ah pretty good so that looks pretty good
oh and you have currents and walnuts in there against every fiber of my being I
put walnuts in okay so there's a long-standing if those you aren't
Canadian and don't eat these on a regular basis there's a long-standing
argument and disagreement Canadian Canada wide do you put raisins and or
other things in your butter tarts there are is the no group there is the yes
group and then there's people like me who lead it forth
it doesn't matter I don't care it's always good I'm I'm definitely in the no
group for nuts for now for nuts yeah I don't I don't mind raisins or currants
in them and this is kind of partway between runny and stiff mm-hmm
I'm sorry but this is not my favorite butter tart ever okay is it a good
butter tart though what's up hmm it's not a bad butter tart any
handmade butter tart he's a good fighter he's a good butter tart mm-hmm um having
said that like pretty much anyone who lived in Toronto or still lives in
Toronto who gets in the car Friday night with their family and drives to the
cottage outside of the city we would drive past five or six places on our way
to the core tha's that sold butter tarts but we wouldn't stop at them because
there was only one place that actually sold butter tarts I'm not part of that
culture I have what my family makes for butter tarts we do not have four no
cottage no driving no secret butter tarts - but who has the best butter
tarts is also one of those largely debated things here in Ontario just
beside the city trial there's like four different butter tart trails where you
could drive from butter tart place to butter tart place on a torn I've got a
map and you go there and they so if you don't like one you'll find what you do I
find one you do like so this is the second butter tart recipe that we've
done on there on this channel Astin was a long time ago 9 or 10 years ago
and that was the five roses right five roses original I think I don't remember
that but every other week from here on out until we run out of butter tart
recipes I'm going to do a different butter tart
okay so then I'm gonna ask just to set us up here because I'm curious are you
going to do strictly butter tarts are you going to eggs kind of push into the
other parts of butter tarts like the so I like ones with like the jam and the
coconut the one what are those those are on maid-of-honor charts that's what they
called Native honors made of water charts no I'm not gonna do those all
right but I may jump out and do the Bakewell tart which is a Scottish thing
okay um there's another thing called a border
tart which was a Scottish thing pecan tarts tart dough sook yeah which
apparently most people think that the daughters of the King brought to new
France in the 1630 huh so that's and that and that those
you know the daughters of the king are anyway they brought a bunch of recipes
which a lot of people think turned into this okay so I make I make touch on all
of those things just to show how overtime overtime house how this came to
be so come on back and be over sweetened with us with butter tarts thanks for
stopping by
you