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Mince Meat

A sweet mixture of beef tongue, suet, dried fruit, spices, wine, and brandy used in pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Mince Meat

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Cook the beef tongue until tender, then chop finely.

  2. Mix the chopped tongue with suet, raisins, currants, sugar, apples, nutmeg, mace, cloves, allspice, and cinnamon.

  3. Stir in the wine and brandy.

  4. Add citron and mix well.

  5. When making pastry, add a little cider to moisten it.

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. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Nutmeg + macetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

  4. Apple + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,774 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef tongue
Provides the cooked meat that forms the bulk of the filling.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the mixture rich and moist as it sits.
Raisins
Add sweetness and a chewy texture that contrasts with the meat.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps preserve the mixture.
Apples
Add moisture and a mild tartness that balances the sweetness.
Brandy
Adds aroma and helps preserve the mixture.

The step that matters

Cook the beef tongue until tender. The tongue must be fully tender before chopping, because tough meat stays chewy and uneven in the finished filling.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, raisin, sugar, apple, nutmeg, mace, clove):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, raisin, sugar, apple, nutmeg, mace, clove. 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 meat recipes

Pie Filling 11Pie 10with Apples 9Preserved 8Apple 7Mock 7 See all 183 →

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