Welcome to my Blogmas! I’m so excited to be posting blogs throughout December this year. Make sure you subscribe so you don’t miss any and I really hope you enjoy them. I’ve got lots of exciting things planned and some blogs to suit everyone so hopefully I’ve got you covered!
You can’t go wrong with mince pies at Christmas so let’s start on a high and get baking! For these festive treats, I’ve used a Mary Berry recipe as inspiration but made a few changes. I didn’t make any mince pies last year and my first mince pie was Christmas Day so this year I’m making up for it! This is such a great one to make ahead and then warm up when you have guests coming around!
Recipe (makes 12)
Mincemeat
400g mixed dried fruit
½ cooking apple, peeled, cored and finely chopped
62g unsalted butter, cubed
112g muscovado sugar
½ tsp cinnamon
½ tsp mixed spice
grated rind of ½ lemon
juice of ½ lemon
200ml sherry
Pastry
275g plain flour, plus extra for rolling
50g caster sugar
125g unsalted butter, cubed
½ tsp vanilla essence
1 egg yolk
1tbsp. cold water
Equipment
12-hole muffin tray
Method
- First make the mincemeat. This can be made up to six months ahead of time as the sugar and alcohol preserve the ingredients! I didn’t wait that long though!
- Heat all the ingredients of the mincemeat over a low heat (except the sherry). When the butter has melted, simmer gently for 10 minutes. Take off the hob and leave to cool. Add the Sherry and store in a sterilised jar until ready to use.
- To make the pastry, put the flour, sugar, and butter in a large bowl. Rub the mix with your fingertips until you get a breadcrumb consistency.
- Add the vanilla, egg yolk and water and knead to form a dough. You may need to add more water as you mix. Wrap the dough in cling film and leave in the fridge to chill for 30 minutes.
- Preheat the oven to 2000C when you are ready to roll out the pastry.
- For the pastry cases, roll out the pastry on a floured surface until the pastry is about 3mm thick. Cut 12 circles using 8-9cm pastry cutters (or a small bowl if you don’t have cutters). Cut 12 star shapes using a star cutter. You can use any shapes you like for the decoration part!
- Line each muffin tin hole with a pastry circle, topped ¾ of the way with your mincemeat. Add a pastry star on top of each one.
- Bake the pies for 15-20 mins.
- Leave to cool for a few minutes and then take the pies out of their tin. Finish cooling the pies on a wired cooling rack.
- When ready to eat, eat them as they are or warm them and serve with cream! Mmmmm…..
Will you be baking mince pies this year? Why not tag me photos of your bakes on Twitter?
