Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas without homemade mince pies. This, however, is a proper cheats version. You can of course make your own mincemeat, but for speed and simplicity we use shop bought with a few extras to stir through to make the flavours sing.
Ingredients
- unsalted butter , for greasing
- 375 g ready rolled shortcrust pastry
- plain flour , for dusting
- 200 g quality mincemeat
- 1 splash of brandy
- ½ an eating apple
- 2 balls of stem ginger
- 50 g dried apricots
- 75 g dried cranberries
- 1-2 pinches of mixed spice
- 1 large free-range egg
- 1 tablespoon semi-skimmed milk
- icing sugar, for dusting
Method
- Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas 4, and lightly grease a shallow cupcake tray with butter.
- Roll out half the pastry on a clean flour-dusted surface then cut out 12 circles using a pastry cutter or a clean glass tumbler. Lay them in the hollows of the tray and place in the fridge to chill for 30 minutes.
- Spoon the mincemeat into a mixing bowl, breaking it up with a spoon as you go, then pour in the brandy.
- Peel the apple and chop into small chunks, then finely chop the ginger and apricots and stir it all to the mincemeat with the cranberries and mixed spice.
- Roll out the remaining pastry, then using a star cutter, cut out 12 stars– these will be the lids for your pies.
- Take the pastry bases out of the fridge and fill them just over halfway up with mincemeat, then smooth the filling out to the edges. Beat the egg and milk together, then brush over the top edges of the pastry.
- Lay the stars over the top, then brush with the eggwash.
- Bake for 25 minutes, or until golden. Dust with icing sugar before serving.
Images & styling by Thornback & Peel