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Mince Meat

A suet and beef mixture with raisins, currants, apples, spices, and spirits, cooked until soft and served hot or cold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Raisin and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,390 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

Mince Meat

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mincemeat

  1. Mix the suet, chopped beef, raisins, currants, brown sugar, molasses, chopped apples, and beef stock in the order given.

  2. Cook until the apples and raisins are soft.

  3. Then add the boiled cider, brandy, rose water, and sherry, and mix well.

Serve and store

  1. This can be eaten hot or cold; if served cold, substitute ½ pound of butter for the suet.

  2. Store in an earthen crock, pack down, and cover with brandy.

  3. This can be kept for over a year; stir occasionally and re-cover with brandy if it gets dry.

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

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

  2. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  3. Cinnamon + macetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Raisin + curranttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Suet
Adds richness and a moist, tender texture as it melts into the fruit mixture.
Raisins
Provide chewy texture and natural sweetness that softens during cooking.
Currants
Add concentrated fruit flavour and chewy texture throughout the mixture.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a deep caramel-like flavour, and helps preserve the mixture.
Chopped apples
Add moisture, tartness, and body that softens into the filling when cooked.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavour and helps preserve the mincemeat in storage.

The step that matters

Cook until the apples and raisins are soft. The fruit must be fully softened so the mixture blends evenly and its texture is uniform. Undercooked apples stay firm and chunky, while the sugar and fruit help the mixture keep well once it is stored under brandy.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Clovefits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, raisin, currant, sugar, molasses, apple, cinnamon. 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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