Skip to main content
Dessert

Another Way to Iveake Mince Pies

A fruit and meat mixture packed into jars and covered with paper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Another Way to Iveake Mince Pies

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit and spices

  1. Stone and chop the bloom raisins.

  2. Chop the orange peel and mince the apples.

  3. Pound the sweet almonds to a paste with a little white wine.

  4. Grate the nutmeg and grind the Jamaica pepper, clove, and cinnamon.

Mix and store

  1. In a large bowl, mix all ingredients well.

  2. Add the white wine and brandy, and mix again.

  3. Pack the mixture tightly into small stone jars and cover with paper.

  4. When ready to use, add a little more wine.

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. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Raisin + almondtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  3. Almond + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,115 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  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

Bloom raisins
Provide sweetness and chewy body that bulks out the filling.
Beef suet
Adds richness and fat that keeps the filling moist and soft.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a molasses depth that balances the acidity of the fruit.
Apples
Contribute moisture and tartness, giving the filling freshness and body.
Sweet almonds
Add fat and a nutty flavour, and help bind the mixture into a paste.
White wine
Adds moisture and acidity, and helps keep the filling loose and fresh.

The step that matters

Pack the mixture tightly into jars. Tight packing removes air pockets, which limits spoilage by oxygen-loving microbes and keeps the filling stable during storage.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (orange, apple, almond, white wine, nutmeg, pepper, clove):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against orange, apple, almond, white wine, nutmeg, pepper, clove. 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 pies recipes

Lemon 10Mock 4Royal 4 See all 116 →

You might also like

Orange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesApple PuddingApple Pudding256 recipesOrange Cream Rice PuddingOrange Cream Rice Pudding121 recipesOrange GelatinOrange Gelatin100 recipes