LONDON (AFP) – Every Christmas, Brits devour about 800 million mince pies, but moves to jazz up the festive sweet treats made of dried fruit and pastry are stirring anger among purists.
It is the source of some puzzlement to the outside world that British mince pies have not in fact been filled with minced meat for centuries.
Instead, the mincemeat encased in an individual shortcrust pastry pie is a mixture of different dried fruits, chopped apples and spices.
In recent years, however, home cooks and big supermarket chains have begun to experiment, putting their own twist on the pies by adding less traditional ingredients to try to tempt more adventurous palates. Variations include topping the individual oven-baked pies with glace icing or frangipane, adding chocolate, salted caramel or even custard to the filling – to the dismay of food writer Felicity Cloake.
“Monstrosities” is how Cloake describes such adaptations, telling AFP mince pies “are not broke and do not need fixing”. It seems palates have become “so jaded these days that we need to ring the changes and have whatever fashionable flavour is currently dominating TikTok in the pies,” she said.
She said she wasn’t against tweaking recipes, but that the fruit and traditional flavours should always be the star attraction. Cloake said her main objections to new recipes were they added overpowering flavours and too much sweetness.
Cloake concedes, however, that some innovations can be tasty such as the mince pies produced by London bakery Pophams.
Although she said the Pophams’ version “tests” her traditionalist stance it was still “really rather good”.
The bakery uses its signature croissant dough for a mince pie filled with classic mincemeat and citrus and ginger-flavoured cream. It describes it as a blend of “nostalgic flavour with a fresh, contemporary twist”.
But some mince pie traditionalists said even careful adaptations were probably “too much”.
According to Britain’s National Archive, a newly discovered 17th Century recipe for “minst pyes” included minced meat – often lamb, but sometimes even beef.
