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Mince Pies

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 21 ingredients
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Mince Pies

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 Pies

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Peel the oranges and lemons, then rub the rinds on the sugar.

  2. Add the ground ginger, powdered bitter almonds, coriander seeds, cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

  3. Pound the spices thoroughly and sift them.

  4. Mix the spice blend with the sugar-rubbed rinds and store in a tightly sealed jar.

  5. Chop the raisins, currants, figs, preserved ginger, mixed peel, boiled salt beef, tripe, suet, and apples together.

  6. Combine the chopped mixture with the spices.

  7. Transfer to stone vessels and let it stand for 2 days.

  8. Pour 1 bottle of brandy and 1 bottle of port wine over the mixture, ensuring each jar gets its share.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Ginger + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Lemon + coriandertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,498 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Almond + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,514 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

Swap the almond

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (orange, lemon, sugar, ginger, coriander, clove, cinnamon):

  1. Chickpeafits better
  2. Almondthe original
  3. Cashew nutfits about as well
  4. Pistachiofits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against orange, lemon, sugar, ginger, coriander, clove, cinnamon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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