Recipe 21- Brown Butter Tarts
Good Afternoon everyone! Today my morning started bright and early as I headed off to my yearly tradition, The Elmira Maple Syrup Festival. I have been saving this tart recipe for the perfect time as it contains pure maple syrup.. and what better way to celebrate the festival then making some warm gooey tarts with fresh syrup!
Even since I was a child, I really looked forward to the Elmira syrup festival, almost as much as Christmas...seriously! I have been attending for over 15 years and this year it celebrated its 50th Birthday! As always the crowds are large and local businesses have set up booths selling their products and crafts. Most years, the weather was dreary, cold and windy. A short tractor ride into town makes you glad that you have bundled up for the day.
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| Me& "Flap Jack - Log Sawing Competition- Local Crafts |
With my Tim Hortons Coffee in hand I started off by stoping by the "Big Ass Garlic" booth. They produce locally grown garlic and always have a wonderful variety of their products available on site. And let me tell you, their garlic is HUGE! In the picture below, I have set a regular garlic beside the 2 I picked up this morning. I can't wait to use these in upcoming recipes.
So your probably wondering... so did you buy any maple syrup? Well I actually didn't buy any AT the festival. My husbands job is delivering fuel to local businesses and farms. He received a bottle of fresh maple syrup as a thank you and that's what I used for todays Brown butter tart recipe.
Our syrup came from Snyder Heritage farms which is very local to us. The are located in Breslau Ontario and have been farming for over 100 years. They syrup is one of the best I have had hands down!
Well I guess I will wrap it up here of my travel today, I am really glad that I could share a little bit of my travels today with you! Let me know if you have ever visited the Elmira Maple Syrup Festival :)
Lets get started!
Last night I made sure to stick one cup worth of butter into my freezer. Chef Michael Smith directs you to use frozen butter when making your tart shells. This recipe like many starts off by mixing dry ingredients. I mixed together flour, salt, sugar and freshly ground nutmeg. As an experiment, I wanted to know how much of the whole nutmeg you would need to make one teaspoon. It takes slightly less then half- I learn something new every time I cook these recipes :)
Next up is the frozen butter. You are actually instructed to grate the frozen butter using a box grater. This way the cold butter will evenly mix into your dry ingredients. Its essential to keep the butter cold, this will produce fluffy shells.
It was quite interesting to see frozen grated butter and it mixed nicely into the dry mixture. I really like this technique, opposed to the pastry cutter.. who ACTUALLY owns one of those lol ?
Next step was adding ice cold water. I added some ice cubes to a large glass measuring cup of water and just poured what I needed for the recipe, and this also ensures a nice cool drink for the next part of this recipe.
Now you will be using a wooden spoon handle as well... a spoon. You carefully mix in your water and then its time to get your hands messy.
It took some time to get everything into one uniform ball. I actually said to my husband, "I am sure Chef Michael doesn't struggle with mixing this dough, his hands are HUGE" :)
Next was the part I was the most nervous about.
BROWNING BUTTER!?!
So I literally put butter into a pan and hope that I don't burn it as it gets darker.... YIKES!
So I am pretty sure that I slightly burnt my butter. It did have some granules of dark brown/ black in the butter mixture. But it tasted pretty darn good.
I added in my pure maple syrup and woah was I in for a surprise. It bubbled up like those science projects that involve baking soda and vinegar.
Next step was to add in the other wet ingredients. Eggs, brown sugar and vanilla are whisked together and then added to a slightly cooled brown butter mixture. I then added in some flour and whisked everything smooth. I poured my mixture from the pot into a large measuring cup. This made it much easier to fill my tart shells. I am not going to lie, I tasted that gooey mixture like 100 times. It was delicious! Who cares their is raw egg in there... GO FOR IT!
Into the oven went the first dozen tarts. After about 5 minutes I realized my tart shells were on the small side. The tart 'goo' was oozing over the shells and starting to get dark. These tarts have a quick bake time of 12 minutes, so I just kept my eye on them and made sure to correct my shell size for pan 2.
This recipe yielded 24 tarts. And you will want ALL 24 tarts.. TRUST ME!
They have the greatest flavour and just the right amount of sweetness. The shells are melt in your mouth good and I really enjoyed the nutmeg inside the shell, it really compliments the browned butter and maple syrup flavour. I could hardly resist waiting for these to cool to take my first bite!
I wish the picture below was a scratch and sniff!
I hope you enjoyed reading about my small trip today and my experience making these delicious tarts.
As always my compliments to the chef and cheers to you, my friends!
Link to the Recipe:
http://www.foodnetwork.ca/recipe/brown-butter-tarts-with-maple-and-nutmeg/12909/
Link to Snyder Heritage Farms:
http://snyderheritagefarms.com/products/maple-syrup/
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