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Mince Meat

A stew of minced meat with currants, apples, raisins, and spices, simmered for hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Cider and apple are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,238 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Mince Meat

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a large pot, combine the meat, currants, chopped citron, boiled cider, brown sugar, molasses, cloves, and cider.

  2. Gradually heat the mixture to boiling, adding more liquid as needed.

  3. Stir in the chopped apples, beef suet, seeded raisins, chopped candied orange peel, lemon juice, and grated rind.

  4. Add cinnamon, mace, and salt to taste.

  5. Simmer for four hours or until the desired consistency is reached.

  6. Add a little raspberry juice before serving.

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. Cider + appletop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,238 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  2. Clove + appletop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,774 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Currant + cidertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together500 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  4. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Meat + beeftop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,533 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef suet
Adds richness and fat, giving the stew a rounded, moist mouthfeel.
Molasses
Adds dark sweetness and depth of flavor while keeping the stew moist.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps build a thick, sticky body as the liquid reduces.
Apples
Add tartness and body that softens into the stew during long simmering.
Raisins
Add sweetness and chewy texture as they plump in the simmering liquid.

The step that matters

Simmer for four hours. Long, gentle simmering lets the liquid reduce and the flavors blend, but too hard a boil can scorch the sugars on the bottom of the pot. Stir occasionally and add liquid as needed to reach the desired consistency.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, cider, sugar, molasses, clove, apple, beef):

  1. Figfits better
  2. Pearfits better
  3. Grapefits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, cider, sugar, molasses, clove, apple, beef. 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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