Canadian Butter Tart

Canada’s answer to pecan pie

For readers who know pecan pie, the butter tart is a useful reference point: a small pastry shell filled with a liquid brown-sugar mixture that bakes into something between a custard and a caramel. Where pecan pie leans on nuts for texture, the butter tart’s defining trait is a filling left deliberately runny at the center — or, depending on which side of the country’s long-running debate you ask, set firm. Maple syrup, in place of the corn syrup an American version might use, is the one ingredient nearly everyone agrees belongs.

History

The butter tart is widely considered one of the few truly native Canadian desserts, with documented recipes dating back to the late 19th century in Ontario, likely stemming from Scottish and English settler pastry traditions adapted with locally available ingredients like maple syrup.

A long-standing and genuinely lively debate divides butter tart lovers across Canada: should the filling be runny or set, and should raisins be added? Many small Ontario towns now offer “butter tart trails” and festivals letting visitors compare and judge competing versions for themselves.

Ingredients — for 12 tartlets

• Shortcrust pastry for 12 tartlets (homemade or store-bought)
• 200 g (1 cup) brown sugar
• 100 g (⅜ cup) melted butter
• 2 eggs
• 60 ml (¼ cup) maple syrup
• Raisins (optional, to taste)

Canadian butter tart recipe, step by step

1. Line small tartlet tins with thinly rolled shortcrust pastry.
2. Scatter a few raisins in the bottom of each tart shell, if using.
3. Whisk the brown sugar, melted butter, eggs, and maple syrup until smooth.
4. Pour this liquid filling into each tart shell, filling to about two-thirds.
5. Bake at 200°C (390°F) for about 15-18 minutes, until the filling is puffed and lightly browned at the edges.
6. Let cool before unmolding; the filling firms up slightly as it cools while staying runny in the center.

Cooking method

Technique: a liquid filling of brown sugar and maple syrup that caramelizes and puffs slightly while baking, then settles as it cools.

Traditional equipment: individual tartlet tins, a standard home oven.

Tips: watch the baking closely; an overbaked filling turns hard, while the beloved version stays runny at the center.

Nutrition, per tartlet

Calculated from the raw ingredient quantities, divided across 12 tartlets.

Nearly all of the 36 g of carbohydrate per tartlet is sugar — brown sugar and maple syrup together — rather than starch from the pastry shell itself, which is why the filling reads as distinctly sweeter and more syrupy than a typical fruit tart of the same size.

Economic context

Maple syrup is the one ingredient that ties the butter tart specifically to Canada rather than to any generic settler-era baking tradition — a domestically produced sweetener that made its way into the recipe as it adapted to what was locally available in 19th-century Ontario.

Source: World Bank / FAO, Food Prices for Nutrition database (Cost and Affordability of a Healthy Diet) v4.0, 2024 data, CC BY 4.0, DOI 10.57966/41AN-KY81. Retrieved 29 July 2026. This figure describes the cost of a healthy diet in Canada generally — it is not a costing of this specific recipe.

Who this dish suits

What about you?

In your opinion, what’s the best place or restaurant to enjoy a great butter tart?

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