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Dessert

Perfection Mince Meat

A sweet fruit mixture of currants, raisins, citron, apples, spices, sherry wine, and whiskey, simmered until thickened.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and sherry work together. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 395 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Perfection Mince Meat

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mincemeat

  1. Combine currants, raisins, citron, brown sugar, and chopped apples in a large bowl.

  2. Add spice to taste, sherry wine, and whiskey.

  3. Cook the mixture over low heat until well combined and thickened.

Preserve

  1. Seal the mixture in jars while hot.

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. Apple + sherrytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together395 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  2. Apple + winetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,207 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  3. Currant + raisintop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

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

  4. Currant + sherrytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together393 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Currant + appletop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,918 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

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

What each ingredient does

Currants
Provide concentrated sweetness and chewy body to the filling.
Raisins
Add moisture, sweetness and chewy texture to the mincemeat.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the fruit mixture thicken as it cooks.
Apples
Contribute moisture and bulk, breaking down to help thicken the filling.
Sherry wine
Adds acidity and depth of flavour to the fruit mixture.
Whiskey
Adds aroma and flavour while helping preserve the mixture.

The step that matters

Cooking over low heat until thickened. Gentle heat lets the apples and fruit soften and release moisture gradually, so the mixture thickens evenly without scorching the sugars. Too much heat can burn the sugars and leave the fruit dry or unevenly cooked.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (currant, sugar, apple, sherry, wine):

  1. Plumfits better
  2. Pearfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Raisinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against currant, sugar, apple, sherry, wine. 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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