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Mince Meat

A preserved beef mixture with raisins, apples, suet, sugar, whiskey, blackberry wine, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Mince Meat

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Cook the beef until tender.

  2. Cool the beef.

  3. Chop the beef.

Prepare the fruit and suet

  1. Peel the apples.

  2. Chop the apples.

  3. Chop the suet.

  4. Chop the raisins.

Mix and seal

  1. In a large bowl, mix the suet and sugar.

  2. Add the raisins to the mixture.

  3. Add the apples to the mixture.

  4. Add the cold beef to the mixture.

  5. Add the spices to the mixture.

  6. Add the wine to the mixture.

  7. Add the whiskey to the mixture.

  8. Stir all the ingredients well together.

  9. Seal the mixture in jars.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

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

  3. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  4. Apple + blackberrytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together110 recipes

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

  5. Apple + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,774 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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 bulk that gives the mincemeat its substance.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the filling moist and rich as it stands.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps preserve the mixture.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy texture.
Apples
Add moisture, tartness and body to the filling.
Blackberry wine
Adds acidity and fruity flavor, and moisture to the mixture.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, apple, sugar, blackberry, wine, clove, cinnamon):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Pearfits better
  3. Quincefits better
  4. Raisinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, apple, sugar, blackberry, wine, clove, cinnamon. 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 recipes

Pie Filling 11Pie 10with Apples 9Preserved 8Apple 7Mock 7 See all 183 →

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