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Mince Meat (Four pounds of solid meat)
Four pounds of solid meat chopped, four quarts greening apples chopped, two pounds of raisins, two pounds of currants, threequarters of a pound of citron, one-half pound of suet chopped fine, peel of one orange also chopped, two pounds of brown sugar, one-half pint of brandy, three quarts of cider, nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon and salt to taste.
— Mrs. F. T. Beach
A large-batch mincemeat of the kind made once a year and drawn on all winter. The receipt assumes knowledge the modern cook has to supply: the meat is already cooked, the mixture is meant to be simmered down, and the finished quantity is enormous.
- The meat is cooked firstThe receipt gives no method at all. In mincemeat receipts of this kind the "solid meat" is lean beef, free of bone and gristle, boiled until tender, cooled and then chopped; raw beef chopped into the fruit will not cook through in a pie. Save a little of the cooking liquor to loosen the mixture if it tightens.
- Greenings"greening" here most likely means Rhode Island Greening, a firm, very tart apple widely grown in New York and slow to collapse in cooking. Granny Smith is the closest supermarket substitute. Four quarts chopped is roughly 4 to 5 lb of whole apples.
- Currants and citronCurrants here are dried Zante currants, not fresh red currants. Citron is candied citron peel, sold in tubs at holiday time; candied mixed peel will do at a pinch, though it is sweeter and softer.
- SuetBeef suet from a butcher, the hard fat from around the kidney, chopped or grated fine while cold. Packaged shredded suet works. Butter is a common modern swap but gives a softer, greasier filling.
- CiderThis most likely means sweet cider from the press rather than vinegar or the hard cider sold today, though "cider" could also denote the fermented drink. Use fresh unfiltered apple cider. The three quarts serve as the cooking liquid and most of it should reduce away.
- Cook it downCombine everything except the brandy and simmer uncovered, stirring often, until the apples have broken and the mixture is thick and dark with no free liquid — two to three hours. Stir in the brandy off the heat so it is not driven off.
- Spices "to taste"For a batch this size, start with about a tablespoon each of grated nutmeg and cinnamon, a teaspoon of ground cloves and two teaspoons of salt, then adjust once the mixture has simmered a while and the flavors have come forward.
- Yield and storageThis makes roughly 8 to 10 quarts, enough to fill eight or nine nine-inch pies. The original was kept in a stone crock in a cold cellar; because it contains meat, refrigerate what you will use within a week or two and freeze the rest in pint containers.
Mincemeat began as a genuine meat dish — a medieval and early modern way of stretching and preserving beef or mutton with dried fruit, sugar, spice and spirits, all of which slow spoilage. By the time this book was compiled in the Catskills, the meat was already receding: American receipts through the nineteenth century steadily cut the beef and raised the apples. A version like Mrs. Beach's, with four pounds of beef and its own suet, is the older style still holding on. The scale tells you how the household worked: four quarts of apples and three quarts of cider made a crock that sat in a cold cellar and produced pies from Thanksgiving through the winter, with the brandy and sugar doing the keeping.