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Mince Meat

A spiced minced beef mixture with fruit, sugar, molasses, cider, brandy, and spices, cooked slowly and stored in jars.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 20 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and lemon 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 ↓

Mince Meat

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Cook the beef until well done, then season with salt and pepper.

  2. Let the meat cool in the cooking water if not using the same day.

  3. Shred and chop the meat very fine, removing all strings and tough pieces.

Make the filling

  1. Add the chopped suet and apples to the meat.

  2. Mix in the raisins, currants, citron, orange and lemon rind and juice, brown sugar, molasses, boiled cider, sweet cider or wine, and brandy.

  3. Stir in the ground spices thoroughly.

  4. Cook the mixture slowly for 2 hours.

Store

  1. Pour into stone jars and let it remain uncovered until the next day.

  2. Store in a cool place; it will keep until spring.

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. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Apple + orangetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,230 recipes

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

  4. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Pepper + orangetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,402 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Lean beef
Forms the bulk of the filling, providing body and a meaty base for the mixture.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the filling moist and rich as it cooks and stores.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and depth, and helps preserve the mixture.
Molasses
Adds dark color, sweetness and a robust flavor.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavor and helps preserve the mixture.
Raisins
Add sweetness, chewy texture and moisture to the filling.

The step that matters

Cook the mixture slowly for 2 hours. Slow cooking lets the fruit, sugar, spices and alcohol blend evenly and softens the chopped ingredients, while a fast boil risks scorching the sugars and molasses on the bottom of the pot.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, apple, raisin, orange, lemon, sugar. 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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