Homemade muffins made with raisins and that taste just like the classic Canadian dessert, the Butter Tart! These Butter Tart Muffins taste just like those little bite sized pastry cups filled with the sweet brown sugar filling.
I can never resist eating a butter tart, the classic Canadian dessert! I was curious to see how the flavour would transfer over to a muffin. The verdict? Success! These Butter Tart Muffins taste almost as good as the quintessential dessert.
These muffins taste amazing served slightly warm. And they really do taste like a butter tart! They are sweet with little bits of walnut crunch. They don’t last long either !
If you are craving a butter tart, but don’t feel like dealing with pastry, try these butter tart muffins. I think you’ll find they are the next best thing!
You’ll also like these Pecan Butter Tart Buns.
Why You’ll Love This Muffin Recipe
- Easier to make than fickle pastry for the classic butter tarts
- Made with pantry staple ingredients
- Perfect for holiday dessert tables
- Delicious enough for dessert, brunch, or breakfast
Ingredients Needed
- Raisins
- Sugar
- Salted butter
- Eggs
- Milk
- Vanilla extract
- All-purpose flour
- Baking powder
- Baking soda
- Walnuts
- Maple syrup
- Salt
How To Make Butter Tart Muffins
- Step One: Add sugar, raisins, butter, eggs, milk and vanilla extract to a pot on the stove over medium heat. Cook, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens and begins to bubble. Remove from heat and place uncovered in the fridge to cool down.
- Step Two: Preheat oven to 375F. Add liners to a muffin pan and set aside.
- Step Three: Stir together flour, baking soda and baking powder in a bowl. Make a well in the centre and pour in warm raisin mixture. Stir to combine. Then add walnuts and mix together.
- Step Four: Spoon batter evenly into muffin pan. Bake for about 15 to 17 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean from centre of a muffin.
- Step Five: Remove from oven and immediately pour maple syrup on top of each muffin. Cool for 10 minutes in the pan and then remove them to cool on a wire rack. Serve warm.
Helpful Kitchen Equipment Needed
This post contains affiliate links.
What To Serve With Butter Tart Muffins
- Brownie Bottom Cheesecake
- Caramel Apple Dump Cake
- Cake Mix Cobbler
- Blueberry Cheese Tarts
- Banana Streusel Muffins
Helpful Tips and Tricks
- You can make a double batch of these muffins and save some for later. These muffins freeze well so we like to have extras stashed in the freezer to thaw on whenever we are ready for them.
- Don’t overfil your muffin tin or they’ll have a hard time cooking evenly.
- If you want more dome shaped muffins instead of flatter tops, you can increase the temperature for the first 5 minutes of cooking and then decrease it without opening the door down to the regular baking temperature to finish the baking process.
- You can use paper muffin liners or the reusable silicone cupcake liners. If you are out of cupcake or muffin liners, just be sure to grease the tin. You can use butter and flour like you grease a cake pan or you can grease each individual tin with nonstick baking spray. If you forget, use a knife to run around the edge of each little muffin capsule to help break it away from the tin before trying to remove it.
Recipe Variations and Substitutions
- If you want to jazz these up add some mini chocolate chips to the muffin batter.
- Not a fan of raisins? Ditch them, maybe try dried cranberries, bananas, or craisins if you prefer any of those.
- For even more flavor, add cinnamon to your butter tart muffin batter.
Leftover Storage
Leftover muffins should be transferred to an airtight container or a ziptop bag and you can leave these muffins at room temperature.
Always make sure to let the muffins cool down before storing them.
You do not need to refrigerate your muffins. This tends to dry them out faster, so we recommend just keeping them at room temperature if possible.
Can I Freeze This?
Sure can! This is something we enjoy doing so we can always have some muffins on hand.
Make sure muffins cool prior to freezing. It’s also helpful to flash freeze them so they don’t have to all stick together in your container or freezer safe bag.
Do I have to use walnuts?
No, you can swap the walnuts out for other nut choices, or just omit them altogether.
If you take them out completely, you can add more raisins or other add ins to help bulk up the muffin batter if you want. You can just leave the batter with the other ingredients as well.
What makes a muffin light and fluffy?
Usually, what makes a muffin light and fluffy is when you are using room temperature ingredients.
If you want light and fluffy Butter Tart Muffins, be sure to use room temperature eggs, butter, and milk.
Using room temperature ingredients, when mixed together, helps them form a more smooth mixture that traps the air in the batter so it can expand properly when baking in the oven.
When the batter expands, it makes those light and fluffy muffins that you know and love.
How do you transfer the muffin batter evenly?
To transfer the wet muffin batter evenly to your lined muffin tins, we like to use a measuring spoon or something like that. This way you know how much of the batter is actually being transferred to each muffin liner.
When we don’t want to use a measuring spoon, it cna be easier to just use an ice cream scoop. This tends to be the go to method when we are making many muffins at one time. It transfers the batter faster, in bigger portions.
More Tart Recipes
If you love the original Butter Tarts that these muffins were inspired by then you need to try these tart recipes:
- Butter Tart Squares
- Pecan Butter Tarts
- Chocolate Cream Tarts
- Caramel Apple Tarts
- Keto Pecan Butter Tarts
- Pineapple Tarts
Try this Poutine.
Follow me on Instagram @simplystacieblog, Facebook at Simply Stacie, TikTok @simplystacierecipes or Pinterest at @simplystacie and let me know how you liked this recipe and my other recipes.
If you make the recipe, rate it on the recipe card below and tag me on Instagram and use #simplystacie. I like sharing the photos on my Instagram stories!
Butter Tart Muffins
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups raisins
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- ½ cup salted butter
- 2 large eggs
- ½ cup milk
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 2 tsp baking soda
- ½ cup chopped walnuts
- ¼ cup maple syrup
- pinch salt
Instructions
- Add sugar, raisins, butter, eggs, milk and vanilla extract to a pot on the stove over medium heat. Cook, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens and begins to bubble. Remove from heat and let cool.
- Preheat oven to 375°F. Add cupcake liners to a muffin pan and set aside.
- Stir together all-purpose flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt in a large mixing bowl. Make a well in the centre and pour in warm raisin mixture. Stir to combine. Then add walnuts and mix together
- Spoon batter evenly into muffin pan. Bake for about 15 to 17 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean from centre of a muffin.
- Remove from oven and immediately pour maple syrup on top of each muffin. Cool for 10 minutes in the pan and then remove them to cool on a wire rack. Serve warm.
Kitchen Tools
Nutrition
The information shown is an estimate provided by an online nutrition calculator. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
Doris Calvert says
My husband will go crazy, his favorite desert is Butter Tarts , going to surpris him, we tried a few of your favorite recipies and we loved EVERY one, so thanks it’s nice to have new ideas!
Shirley OFlynn says
I have to make these for my husband. He will love these!
olga says
Just pulled these out of the oven! They smell delicious! The only change I made to the recipe was to use brown sugar instead of white, just like butter tart filling!
Barbie says
Hi, your recipe says to add raisins in 2 places…do you put them on the stove with the first mixture, or later with the walnuts? Thanks
Stacie says
Thanks for the heads up! That was a typo in the recipe. The raisins are added in step one only.
Pamela Weber says
Hey there Stacie!!! Great to see a fellow Ontarian doing great things here on Pinterest! I realized I cannot Pin this recipe to my board……is this a technicality issue? LOL I’m not great with commputers really so LMk if you can help!
Stacie says
Hey! Nice to meet you and glad you found my site!!! It was a glitch on Pinterest’s end today and I was having issues as well. I think it’s resolved now. Fingers crossed!
Diane says
I made these today. Super easy, but is it normal for the eggs to almost “scramble” in the raisin/butter/sugar mixture? I haven’t tasted them yet, can I expect to find bits of scrambled egg in these muffins?!?!
Ann Marie Torrey says
That’s my question as well. I think I’ll add the eggs when the other cooked ingredients are room temp
Joan says
I could taste the baking power and soda. One of each would have been enough.
Linda says
I have been making these for over 25 years (my husband’s favorite) and my recipe calls for 2 tsp. baking powder and 1 tsp. baking soda.
Ann Marie Torrey says
I would think it would be easy to scramble the eggs when cooking in the hot ingredients? Wouldn’t it be better to add the eggs when the other cooked ingredient’s are more room temperature?