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Dessert

Plain Mince-meat

A mixture of beef, suet, dried fruit, spices, and sweet liquids, cooled and seasoned, then rested.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 20 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 ↓

Plain Mince-meat

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Boil the beef in enough water to cover it until tender.

  2. Cool the beef and chop it finely.

Combine and season

  1. In a large bowl, combine the chopped beef with suet, raisins, currants, citron, apples, sugar, nutmeg, salt, pepper, cloves, allspice, cinnamon, and mace.

  2. Add lemon essence, wine, molasses, sweet cider, and brandy to the mixture.

  3. Moisten the mixture with some of the pot liquor and the fat that forms on top.

  4. Adjust seasoning to taste and let it sit for a day before using.

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. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  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. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Lean beef
Provides the meaty body of the filling, bulking it out with savory richness.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the filling moist and gives a rich mouthfeel.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps preserve the mixture.
Brandy
Adds aroma and acts as a preservative that helps keep the mixture stable.
Apples
Contribute moisture, tartness, and body to the filling.
Molasses
Adds depth, dark color, and a rich sweetness.

The step that matters

Let the mixture sit for a day. Resting lets the spices, fruit, alcohol, and fat blend and mellow, so the flavors meld rather than tasting sharp or separate.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, raisin, apple, sugar, nutmeg, pepper, 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.

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