Jersey Pie
1/2 pound of currants. 1/2 pound of seedless raisins. 1 pound of brown sugar and molasses mixed. A little salt and pepper. 1 ounce of mixed ground spices--cinnamon, mace, cloves and alspice. 1/2 pound of crushed crackers or dry bread crumbs. 1 pint of cold water. 1/2 pint of vinegar or hard cider. 2 tablespoonfuls of lemon extract. 3/4 pound of butter, melted. 4 beaten eggs. Mix all the dry articles in a bowl, then add the fluids to the eggs, and pour over and mix in the melted butter by hard stirring. The proportion of molasses to sugar may be according to kind. All syrup will do. Make like other mince pies. A half pint of brandy added makes the resemblance very close. Makes about 10 pies, more or less, according to size.
This is a mock mince — no meat, no suet, the body supplied by cracker crumbs and butter. It is written at bakery scale, so the first decision is how far to cut it down.
- Yield and scalingThe recipe claims about ten pies, "more or less, according to size"; it does not say what size. Quartered, it makes two or three; at that size use 2 oz currants, 2 oz raisins, 4 oz sugar-and-molasses, 2 oz crumbs, 1/2 cup water, 1/4 cup vinegar, 3 oz butter and 1 egg.
- An ounce of spiceOne ounce of mixed ground spice is roughly 4 to 5 tablespoons, and it is meant to carry ten pies. Weigh it if you can; measured by volume, ground cinnamon and allspice vary a good deal in density.
- Salt and pepperThe pepper is not an error. Pepper turns up in a fair number of nineteenth-century mincemeat recipes and gives the sweetness a warm edge; a quarter teaspoon in the full batch is enough to notice.
- Crackers"Crushed crackers" most likely means plain soda or water crackers rather than a sweet graham type. They stand in for the chopped meat, absorbing the liquid and giving the filling grain. The recipe treats dry breadcrumbs as an equal substitute.
- Let it standMixed, the filling looks alarmingly thin. Give it 30 to 60 minutes before it goes into the shells so the crumbs and dried fruit take up the pint of water; otherwise the crust soaks through.
- Lemon extractTwo tablespoons across ten pies. Modern extracts are strong and alcohol-based, so measure rather than pour, and add it with the liquids, not to the hot butter.
- "Make like other mince pies"Double crust, vented, on a hot lower shelf: 425F for 15 minutes to set the bottom, then 350F for another 30 to 40 until the filling bubbles at the vents. Cool fully before cutting or the filling runs.
- Vinegar, cider, brandyCider vinegar suits it better than white. Hard cider stands in for the vinegar measure for measure and so adds no extra liquid; the optional half pint of brandy does, and will give a looser filling and a longer bake.
Mock mince pies like this one belong to a long American habit of imitating an expensive dish with pantry staples: the beef and suet of true mincemeat are replaced by cracker crumbs and butter, while the spice, dried fruit, vinegar and molasses do the work of making it taste like the original. Versions circulated under many names through the second half of the nineteenth century — cracker pie, mock mince — and the tie to New Jersey in this title is the kind of loose regional attribution common in cookbooks of the period, generally reported rather than documented. The scale here, ten pies from one mixing bowl, is striking, and the closing note that half a pint of brandy "makes the resemblance very close" is a frank admission of what the recipe is for: putting something like mince pie on the table in a season when mince pie was expected.