Why it works: Apple and white wine work together. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 372 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓
Lemon or Orange Mince Pies
Ingredients
Directions
The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.
Prepare the filling
Squeeze the juice from the lemon or orange.
Boil the outer peel until soft enough to mash.
Chop the boiled peel and mix with apples, suet, sugar, currants, candied peel, and lemon juice.
If the mixture is too dry, add a little white wine.
Shape the pies
Roll out the puff pastry to ½ inch thick and cut into rounds.
Place half of the rounds on a buttered baking tin.
Butter the outside of small tins and place them upside down in the center of the pastry rounds.
Press the pastry around the tins without cutting through.
Wet the edges with beaten egg yolk and place another round of pastry on top.
Alternatively, cut the pastry into squares and place the tins in the center before covering.
Brush the tops with egg wash.
Bake
Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) for 15-20 minutes.
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.
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Apple + white winetop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together372 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
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Lemon + white winetop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,832 recipes
Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).
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Apple + curranttop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,918 recipes
Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
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Currant + white winetop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together276 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
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Lemon + appletop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,551 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Apples
- Add moisture and body to the filling as they soften during mixing and baking.
- Suet
- Adds fat that enriches the filling and keeps it moist and tender.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the filling and helps balance the tartness of the citrus.
- Currants
- Provide chewy texture and concentrated sweetness throughout the filling.
- Candied peel
- Adds concentrated citrus aroma and a chewy, sweet-tart bite.
- Rich puff pastry
- Forms the flaky, buttery crust that puffs and browns in the oven.
The step that matters
Shape the pies. Pressing the pastry around the tins without cutting through keeps the walls sealed; a tear lets the filling leak and the crust bake unevenly.
Flavor stand-ins for the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, apple, sugar, white wine):
- Pearbetter flavor fit
- Orangebetter flavor fit
- Plumbetter flavor fit
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, apple, sugar, white wine. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).
“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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