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Dessert

Mock Mincemeat Tarts

A pastry tart filled with a sweet mixture of currants, candied peel, brown sugar, butter, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 24,377 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Mock Mincemeat Tarts

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Melt the butter in a bowl.

  2. Mix in the brown sugar, currants, chopped candied peel, and grated nutmeg.

Assemble the tarts

  1. Roll out the pastry to ½ inch thick and cut into large rounds.

  2. Place a spoonful of the mixture in the center of each round.

  3. Wet the edges, pinch them up into a ball, and roll out again.

Bake

  1. Score the tops with a knife, brush with egg, and bake at 400°F (200°C) until golden.

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 + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Currant + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,983 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  3. Butter + curranttop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,856 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  4. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sugar + nutmegtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together23,364 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Sugar and nutmeg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 23,364 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Moist brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and its molasses gives the filling a deep flavor.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, helping the filling taste rounded and mellow.
Currants
Provide chewy texture and concentrated fruity sweetness throughout the filling.
Chopped candied peel
Adds citrusy, sweet bursts of flavor and a chewy texture to the filling.
Pastry
Forms the structure that holds the filling and browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Sealing the rounds. Wet edges must be pinched firmly so the pastry seals; a weak seal lets the sugary filling leak and burn on the tray.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, nutmeg. 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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