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Mince Meat

A spiced minced beef mixture with suet, dried fruit, apples, and spices, boiled and packed into jars.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 22 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Mince Meat

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Boil the beef until tender, then let it cool and chop finely.

  2. In a large bowl, mix the chopped beef with the suet.

  3. Add the salt, apples, currants, raisins, and citron to the mixture.

  4. Season with powdered cinnamon, mace, cloves, and nutmeg to taste.

Moisten and store

  1. Pour in boiled cider, brandy, and wine until the mixture is quite soft.

  2. Mix well and pack into stone jars.

  3. Pour brandy over the top and cover tightly.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

  3. Cinnamon + appletop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  4. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

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

  5. Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

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 of the filling.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the filling rich and moist as it firms.
Raisins
Add sweetness and chewy texture through the filling.
Currants
Add sweetness, tartness and chewy texture through the filling.
Apples
Add moisture and a tart, fruity body to the filling.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps preserve it.

The step that matters

Pack into stone jars and cover tightly. The mixture must be soft and well mixed before packing, and the jars must be sealed so air cannot dry or spoil the filling. Covering it tightly keeps moisture in and limits spoilage during storage.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (raisin, sugar, cinnamon, apple, lemon, nutmeg, beef):

  1. Orangefits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Cranberryfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, sugar, cinnamon, apple, lemon, nutmeg, beef. 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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