is an English pastry made with golden syrup or treacle. The earliest published Canadian recipe is from Barrie, Ontario, dating back to 1900 and can be found in The Women's Auxiliary of the Royal Victoria Hospital Cookbook, to which a Mrs. Mary Ethel MacLeod submitted the recipe for a butter tart filling. The original cookbook and recipe is housed at the Simcoe County Archives. Another early publication of a butter tart recipe was found in a 1915 pie cookbook. The food was an integral part of early Canadian cuisine and often viewed as a source of pride. Similar tarts are made in Scotland, where they are often referred to as Ecclefechan butter tarts from the town of Ecclefechan. In France, they are related to the much more common , that differs from the basic Canadian recipe only by the addition of ground almonds. Cultural identity Butter tarts are an integral part of Central Canadian cuisine and are objects of cultural pride of many communities across Ontario and other provinces in central Canada. This cultural and community connection with the tart has spawned butter tart themed tourism such as the Butter Tart festival at Muskoka Lakes, Ontario, the trademarked "Butter Tart Trail" at Wellington North, Ontario, and the "Butter Tart Tour" in Kawarthas Northumberland, Ontario. The two competing associations have since resolved their dispute, called "The Butter Tart Wars" by Canadian Living, through the mutual agreement to modify "The Butter Tart Tour" to "Kawarthas Northumberland Butter Tart Tour". The first Kawarthas Northumberland Butter Tart Tour Taste-Off was launched at the Flavour Festival in Peterborough on Sunday, April 28, 2013, where four bakeries were crowned winners by a panel of celebrity judges. Ontario's Best Butter Tart Festival and Contest is an annual event held in Midland, Ontario. The contest portion of the festival attracts bakers from across Ontario, and is Canada's largest butter tart–themed celebration, with over 50,000 tarts sold in the festival market in 2014. National Geographic recognized the significance of the butter tart in an article on Georgian Bay, Ontario. In October 2013, referring to a stand in Wasaga Beach, they stated that "It's the homemade Canadian butter tarts – flaky crust with gooey pecan filling – that set this place apart from other lakeside ice cream stands." The production of butter tarts in Canada slowed after a flood in Quebec, in April 2019, striking a major production centre. Global