Christmas just wouldn’t be Christmas without Mince Pies…
Ingredients:
- 12 oz/350g all purpose/plain flour
- Pinch of salt
- 8oz/ 225g butter, cubed or an equal mix of butter and lard
- 1 beaten egg + 1 cold water as needed
- 1 jar of mincemeat, shop bought or homemade
- 2 tbsp icing sugar
Preparation:
Heat the oven to 400°F/205°C/Gas 6
Make the Pastry
- Place the flour, butter and salt into a large clean bowl.
- Rub the butter into the flour with your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs, working as quickly as possible to prevent the dough becoming warm.
- Add the egg to the mixture and using a cold knife stir, add cold water a teaspoon at a time until the mixture binds but don’t make it too wet that it is sticky.
- Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and chill for a minimum of 15 minutes, up to 30 minutes.
The dough can also be made in a food processor by mixing the flour, butter and salt in the bowl of the processor on a pulse setting. When the mixture resembles breadcrumbs, add the egg a slowly, through the funnel until the dough, then add water a tsp at a time until the dough comes together in a ball. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill as above.
Assemble the Pies
- Choose a muffin or bun tin for the size of the pie you want. Choose from a standard 12-cup muffin tin down to small canapé size. The number of pies will depend on the size of cup you choose.
- Dust a work surface lightly with a little flour and roll out two-thirds of the pastry to 1/8″/3mm thick. Cut circles to line the cups of your tin, don’t worry if the pastry doesn’t come to the top.
- Fill the pastry lined tins 2/3 full with mincemeat.
- Roll out the remaining pastry to the same thickness and cut smaller circles to fit as lids on the tarts or to be decorative, cut stars or other fancy shapes.
- Dampen the edges of the tart bases with a little cold water and press the lids on. Make a small hole in the surface of each pie with a small sharp knife to allow the steam to escape (you can omit this if using star-shaped lids).
- Bake in the preheated oven for 20 mins (15 mins if making canape size) or until golden brown. Remove from the oven and sprinkle with the icing sugar.
