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Dessert

Superlative Mincemeat

A fruit and spice mixture used as filling for mince pies.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Superlative Mincemeat

Oven, in the book's wordsA fierce oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a fierce oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the mincemeat

  1. Boil the lemons until tender.

  2. Chop the lemons small, removing all the seeds.

  3. Combine the chopped lemons with the other prepared ingredients in a large bowl. Mix well.

  4. Add 3 to 4 glasses of brandy.

Make and bake the pies

  1. Butter some tin pattypans.

  2. Line the pattypans with thin puff pastry.

  3. Fill the pastry with the mincemeat.

  4. Moisten the edges of the covers.

  5. Close the pies carefully.

  6. Trim off excess pastry.

  7. Make a small hole in the center of each crust.

  8. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for 30 minutes. Cover with paper if they brown too quickly.

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. Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

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

  4. Raisin + brandytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,768 recipes

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

  5. Raisin + orangetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,684 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

Lemons
Provide tender, tart body and aroma to the filling after boiling and chopping.
Golden pippins
Add moisture and sweet-tart bulk that gives the filling its body.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the filling moist and rich as it bakes.
Pounded sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps preserve it.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavor and helps preserve the mincemeat.

The step that matters

Covering the pies to control browning. The sugar and fruit in the filling brown quickly in the oven, so the crust can darken before the pie is cooked. Covering with paper slows browning while the heat finishes cooking the filling.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, raisin, orange, sugar, brandy):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Apricotfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, raisin, orange, sugar, brandy. 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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