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Cooked Meat for Mince Pies

A seasoned, sweetened beef mixture with apples, suet, dried fruit, molasses, cider, and spices, used as filling for mince pies.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and cider are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,238 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Cooked Meat for Mince Pies

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the beef

  1. Wash the beef and place it in a kettle with enough water to cover it.

  2. Bring the beef to a boil, skimming off the scum.

  3. Add hot water as needed until the beef is tender.

  4. Season the beef with salt and pepper.

  5. Boil the beef uncovered until it is almost dry, allowing the juices to return to the meat.

  6. When the beef begins to fry in its own juice, remove it from heat.

Prepare the beef

  1. Let the beef cool, preferably overnight.

  2. The next day, remove bones, gristle, and stringy bits from the beef.

  3. Chop the beef.

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

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

  2. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Currant + cidertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together500 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

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

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

  5. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Lean beef
Forms the meaty base of the filling, providing bulk and savory flavor.
Suet
Adds richness and a moist, tender texture as it melts during cooking.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the filling taste rich and caramelized.
Cooking molasses
Contributes dark color, deep sweetness, and a moist texture.
Green tart apples
Provide acidity and moisture that balance the sweetness of the fruit and sugar.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy moisture to the filling.

The step that matters

Boil the beef until almost dry. Cooking off most of the liquid concentrates the meat's flavor and lets its juices return to the meat. Stopping too early leaves the filling watery, while cooking too long can make it dry and tough.

Flavor stand-ins for the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, apple, raisin, sugar, molasses, cider, pepper):

  1. Figbetter flavor fit
  2. Plumbetter flavor fit
  3. Grapebetter flavor fit
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, apple, raisin, sugar, molasses, cider, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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.

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