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Dry Mince Meat

A preserved meat mixture of beef, suet, dried fruit, sugar, and spices, packed in a jar for later use.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Dry Mince Meat

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the beef until tender, then chop finely or use a meat grinder.

  2. Chop the suet finely.

  3. Peel, core, and chop the apples finely.

Mix and store

  1. Mix the beef, suet, apples, raisins, currants, brown sugar, and spices together until well blended.

  2. Pack the mixture into a stone jar.

Use

  1. To use, take out the desired quantity and moisten with sweet cider, brandy, or a mixture of both. Alternatively, use a mixture of vinegar and water with a little sugar.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Allspice + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

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 that the dried fruit and sugar are combined with.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the mixture moist and rich in texture.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps preserve the mixture.
Raisins
Add sweetness and chewy moisture to the filling.
Currants
Add concentrated fruit flavour and a soft, chewy texture.
Apples
Add tartness and moisture that balances the sweetness.

The step that matters

Packing the mixture into a stone jar. The mixture is meant to keep without spoiling, so it needs to be well blended and tightly packed to exclude air. Moisture added later at the time of use helps keep it workable.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, raisin, sugar, apple, clove, allspice, 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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