Recipe: Saskatchewan Butter Tarts

I’ll bet that you can’t eat just one. It’s simply not possible!

Ingredients:

Pastry:

• 2 ⅔ cups all purpose flour
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ⅔ cup cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
• 6 tablespoons cold vegetable shortening, cut into pieces
• 8 tablespoons ice water (+/- depending on weather and humidity)

Filling:

• 2 eggs
• 1 cup brown sugar
• ¼ cup maple syrup
• 1 tablespoon melted butter
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• ⅛ teaspoon salt

Directions:

1. Sift the flour and salt into a bowl. Cut in the butter and shortening to make pea-size pieces. Add ice water until dough holds together, then form into a ball. Wrap with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 15 minutes.
2. Roll on a lightly floured surface to about ⅛” thick. Cut the shells using a round cookie cutter that will cut circles that will fit your muffin tin (I like to make mini tarts so I use about a 2″ diameter cutter). You should have about 12 medium or 24 small shells when finished. Put these shells into a greased muffin pan.
3. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F and beat all ingredients together until full of bubbles. Spoon into pastry-lined tins and bake for 20 minutes.

From an out-of-print Chatelaine cookbook, circa 1950