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Dessert

Mock Mince Pies

A sweet pie filling made with raisins, bread crumbs, sugar, molasses, and spices, baked in pie crusts.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Mock Mince Pies

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. In a large bowl, combine warm water, butter, and vinegar.

  2. Stir in raisins, bread crumbs, sugar, and molasses.

  3. Add spices to taste and mix well.

Bake

  1. Fill pie crusts with the mixture and bake until set.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Raisin + molassestop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,577 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

  5. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 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

Bread crumbs
Absorb the liquid and give the filling body in place of meat.
Molasses
Adds dark color, deep sweetness and a rich, moist texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the filling set as it bakes.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the sweetness and mimics the tang of meat mince.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender, moist filling.
Raisins
Add chewy texture and concentrated fruity sweetness.

Swap the raisin

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, vinegar, bread, sugar, molasses. 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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