The first time I cleared my suspicions about mincemeat, was when I was called into the pastry department of the Hilton in London to lend a hand in stirring the heady mix. As tradition has it, one has to stir it once clockwise, and that brought you good luck in the New Year. Don’t know how true that was, ‘cause in the few weeks before Christmas, all I found myself doing was making innumerable mincemeat tarts! The next year, I excused myself from the ‘stir’.

From history
The making of these tarts dates back to an old English Christmas tradition. At one time, mincemeat was made with mutton mince only. As years went by, sugar and spices were mixed into the meat. My guess why this would be done, would be to preserve the meat, though I just cannot imagine the thought of a mix of this nature.

The tale today
Today, mincemeat is a slow cooked mixture of dried fruit and citrus peel, richly spiced and then steeped in alcohol. Traditionally bound in suet (the hard fat around the kidneys and loins in beef and mutton), today most mincemeat preparations avoid the use of any animal fats and use vegetable shortening instead. One piece of advice while making mincemeat - it’s not skill, but patience to mature the fruits that bring out the rich flavours of this dish.

Try out this original recipe

1cup blackcurrants
1cup dark raisins
½cup yellow raisins
½cup yellow dried apricots
¾cup candied citrus peel (avoid the unnatural colourful varieties)
1cup brown sugar
3oranges, zest of one and juice of all three
zest of one lemon
200 g pear or apple, peeled, seeded
and chopped
100 g suet (traditionally
used, replaced with
100 g white unsalted
butter)
40 g candied ginger
¾ tsp grated nutmeg
¾ tsp cinnamon powder
½ tsp clove powder
¼ cup good quality brandy
¼ cup good quality rum

Steep all the ingredients in the juice, except the brandy and the rum. Keep in an airtight container in the refrigerator overnight. The next day, pour all the ingredients out into a roasting pan and bake at 11500 C for about 2 ½ hours. Cover the pan with aluminium foil so that the moisture from the juices is retained in the mixture, while softening the dried fruit during the baking process. The whole purpose of baking the fruits, is to soften them. One needs to be watchful during the baking process and make sure that the mixture does not dry out. When softened and done, remove from the oven and cool-covered. At this time, add in the brandy and rum and give it a good mix. Place it in an airtight container for at least a week for the flavours to steep into each other. Give the jar a shake from time to time. Your mincemeat is now ready to be used either as a filling in small tartshells, or as a filling in pancakes, or churned along with freshly-made ice cream. In fact, this would have numerous other uses. Leftover mincemeat can be stored in the freezer, tightly wrapped in ziplock bags, for at least three months.