Skip to main content
Main

Mince Pie

A savory pie with chopped meat, suet, sugar, apples, currants, and spices, topped with sweet butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Mince Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the filling

  1. In a large bowl, combine the chopped meat, suet, sugar, apples, currants or raisins, and enough cider to moisten the mixture. Add the cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg, and mix well.

Bake

  1. Fill pie crusts with the mixture and dot the top with sweet butter.

  2. Bake for 45 minutes.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Apple + cidertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,238 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Chopped meat
Provides the savoury body and bulk that forms the traditional filling.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the filling moist and rich as it bakes.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps balance the spices and tart apples.
Apples
Contribute moisture, tartness and body to the filling.
Zante currants or raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy texture throughout the filling.
Cinnamon
Adds warm aroma and spice flavour to the filling.

The step that matters

Moistening the filling with cider. Enough cider must be added to moisten the mixture without making it soggy. Too little leaves the filling dry, while too much releases extra liquid during baking and can make the pie crust wet.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, sugar, apple, cider, cinnamon, clove, nutmeg):

  1. Figfits better
  2. Quincefits better
  3. Pearfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, sugar, apple, cider, cinnamon, clove, nutmeg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

More mince pie recipes

Mock 45Filling 14Lemon 8Fruit 5Patties 5Christmas 4 See all 109 →

You might also like

Meat CroquettesMeat Croquettes52 recipesMeatballsMeatballs37 recipesMince MeatMince Meat37 recipesMeat CakesMeat Cakes35 recipes