Skip to main content
Main

Mince Meat

A preserved meat mixture of lean beef, suet, butter, apples, raisins, currants, spices, and brandy, boiled in vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 20 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Lemon and walnut match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,149 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Mince Meat

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine vinegar, cinnamon, mace, cloves, nutmeg, salt, orange juice, orange peel, lemon juice, and lemon peel in a preserving kettle.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil.

  3. Add the remaining ingredients and heat thoroughly.

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. Lemon + walnuttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,149 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Raisin + curranttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  3. Apple + curranttop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,918 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  4. Raisin + walnuttop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together647 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  5. Apple + raisintop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Provides the meaty body and richness that forms the mincemeat's base.
Suet
Adds fat that gives a moist, rich texture as it melts into the mixture.
Apples
Contribute moisture, tartness, and bulk to the mincemeat.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps preserve the mixture while deepening its flavour.
Raisins
Add sweetness, chewy texture, and concentrated fruit flavour.
Brandy
Adds aroma and helps preserve the mincemeat.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, butter, apple, raisin, lemon, walnut, sugar):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, butter, apple, raisin, lemon, walnut, sugar. 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 with apples recipes

and Dried Fruit 5and Raisins 5 See all 9 →

You might also like

Lemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesRoast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipesCorned BeefCorned Beef87 recipes