Farmers' Mince Pies
A historical recipe from Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers, by Lea, Elizabeth E. (Elizabeth Ellicott).
A historical recipe
Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers, by Lea, Elizabeth E. (Elizabeth Ellicott). Project Gutenberg eBook #9101.
From an old book: a historical recipe, not current advice. Its methods, additives and storage may be unsafe by today's standards. Its words name: food kept without cooking or cold storage. Check current food-safety guidance before following this.
Source and licence
From Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers, by Lea, Elizabeth E. (Elizabeth Ellicott). Digitised by Project Gutenberg, eBook #9101 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9101). Public domain in the USA; its status may differ elsewhere.
Read the original Public domain in the USA
What was changed: As printed, from the book's text; Project Gutenberg's header and licence removed. Ingredient lines were read out of the text by a program. A historical recipe, not current advice.
United Kingdom. Associated with United Kingdom by curated dish list: mince pie (confidence 0.75). "Associated with" means only that the evidence named here links this recipe to that place. A recipe isn't labelled as representing an entire country because a source associates it with one, and regional origins are kept where the source gives them.
- Storage. The keeping times and places here are from before refrigeration. Follow current storage guidance.
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Ingredients
- three pounds of suet
- two gallons of chopped apples
- four pounds of raisins
- a gallon of boiled molasses
- a pint of currant wine
- an ounce of cinnamon
Method
- When you kill a beef, save the head for pies;
- it is some trouble to prepare it, but it is very nice for the purpose.
- Split the head, take out the brains and eyes, wash it well in cold water, and soak it all night with two hog's heads that have been cleaned;
- in the morning, boil them till you can take out the bones easily;
- skim off the froth as it rises, or it will stick to the meat;
- pick out the bones, and chop it fine, with three pounds of suet.
- This should be done the day before you want to bake.
- Mix to this quantity of meat, two gallons of chopped apples, four pounds of raisins, half a gallon of boiled molasses, a pint of currant wine, a tea-cup of rose brandy, an ounce of cinnamon, orange peel and mace, from two to four nutmegs, and sweet cider enough to make it the right thickness;
- if the cider is not sweet, put in more molasses;
- when all is mixed, it is best to bake a small pie, as you can alter the seasoning, if it is not to your taste.
- If you have not raisins, dried cherries or small grapes, that have been preserved in molasses, are very good, or stewed dried apples, instead of green;
- and where you have no cider, stew the apples in plenty of water, so as to have them very soft;
- a little good vinegar, sweetened and mixed with water, also does instead of cider, but is not so good.
- This will make about forty pies, and if you have a convenient way of keeping them, you may bake all at once, as they will keep for two months very readily when the weather is cold.
- If you do not bake all at once, put what is left in a jar, cover the top with melted suet, and over this put a piece of white paper, with a tea-cup of spirits poured on the top;
- tie it up and keep it where it will not freeze.
- Where persons have a large family, and workmen on a farm, these pies are very useful.