I make the mincemeat about two weeks in advance so the fruit has time to soak up all the spices and get nice and plump! Then on Christmas Eve, I prepare the pastry and bake these little beauties for lunch on Christmas Day. I first made them last year and my mother and Chris, in particular, really liked them.
Here's the pastry cast!
The mincemeat recipe is from Mary Berry and the pastry crust is from Paul Hollywood! This is a sweet pastry so sugar is mixed with the flour before adding a LOT of butter.
I worked the butter into the sugar and flour for a bit and then added the eggs.
A little cold water was added till the dough just came together.
I decided to divide the pastry into three balls and roll them out between parchment sheets before I refrigerated them. That way they would be nice and cold and ready to be cut into size for the muffin tins.
I also refrigerated the muffin tin! When the pastry was cold and firm, I worked them one at a time; cutting the base out with a cookie cutter and pressing it into the cold tin.
I had rolled the pastry a bit thick so I quickly patted them out a bit thinner before I put them into the tin.
I added the mincemeat right up to the top edge of the crust.
Then I used a smaller cutter for the lids. The lids are gently pressed onto the mincemeat and the upper edge of the base is pushed around the lid's edge. It doesn't have to be super neat; the crust edges merge a bit during baking.
Into a 400F oven for about 25 minutes or until the top crust is nicely golden.
Remove them to a rack immediately and let them cool completely. Because of the high butter content, they are pretty easy to pop out of the tin.
I love the sweet/spicy tang of the mincemeat and the crust is buttery, flaky and so delicious!
Here's the promised link:
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