Mom's Butter Tarts

½ cup raisins (¼ dark & ¼ golden)
¼ cup currants
½ cup nuts (pecan or walnut)
¾ cup brown sugar
1 Tsp. butter
1 large egg
1 Tsp. corn syrup
¼ cup milk
½ Tsp. vanilla
⅛ Tsp. salt
Pie crust (I use a popular store brand already mixed & pre-rolled)

In a bowl, cream sugar & butter, then beat in egg, milk, corn syrup, vanilla & salt.  Stir in raisins, currants & nuts.

Using a round cookie, cut appropriate size for your tart pans.

Spoon the mixture into the pie crust being sure to have some raisins, currants & nuts in each tart.  Fill 2/3 full.

Bake at 350˚ for 10 to 15 minutes.

Note of interest:  Once, when I was helping my mom bake, I asked her why they were called Butter Tarts, since there was such a small amount of butter in the recipe.  She told me that, at one time, the tarts were made with a Butter Nut.  She is no longer here to ask if this is true, but it very well might be true.  When I was young, I remember she made these same tarts with a hickory nut, and then much later had to go to using pecans or walnuts when hickory nuts were no longer available.

Pauline Thackenkary
2006