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Dessert

Summer Mince Pies

A sweet filling made from raisins, nutmeg, water, cinnamon, sugar, butter, vinegar, and crushed crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon 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 ↓

Summer Mince Pies

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. Combine raisins, nutmeg, water, cinnamon, sugar, butter, vinegar, and crushed crackers in a large pot.

  2. Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently, until well combined and thickened.

  3. Allow mixture to cool before using as filling for pies.

Bake the pies

  1. Bake pies according to preferred pie crust recipe.

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 + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Cinnamon + sugartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Raisin + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

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

Cinnamon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Raisins
Provide chewy texture and natural sweetness to the filling.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the filling thicken as it cooks down.
Butter
Adds richness and a soft, smooth mouthfeel to the filling.
Crackers
Crushed crackers soak up liquid and help thicken the filling.
Vinegar
Adds a sharp acidity that balances the sweetness of the filling.

The step that matters

Cool the filling before filling the pies. Hot filling softens the pie crust from underneath and can make it soggy or cause it to lose its structure during baking. Letting the mixture cool first helps the crust hold its shape and bake crisp.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (nutmeg, cinnamon, sugar, butter, vinegar):

  1. Vanillafits about as well
  2. Figfits about as well
  3. Raisinthe original
  4. Blueberryfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against nutmeg, cinnamon, sugar, butter, vinegar. 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.

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