Mincemeat pie still has loyal supporters

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NEW YORK – In an era of tofu ice cream and veggie burgers, mincemeat pie has an image problem.

If only it were called apple-raisin pie, which is what it tastes like.

Most people I know won’t touch it, but I grew up eating mincemeat pie at Thanksgiving and I love it.

It reminds me of my mother, who always made a golden tart especially for me from leftover pie dough with a dollop of mincemeat inside. That sweet and sour mixture of fruit, and the spicy blend of cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice, were the perfect way to cleanse the palate after a big meal of stuffing, turkey and gravy.

But these days, my sister is the only other person I know who’ll eat it. My husband and his family won’t, and neither will my children. I can’t eat a whole mince pie by myself, so I usually don’t make one at all.

How did apple and pumpkin become the default pies for Thanksgiving when mincemeat is so much more interesting? Or is mincemeat’s complexity part of the problem?

My mother was from Maine, so I started my hunt for answers in her native state, by contacting the Harraseeket Inn in Freeport.

For a Thanksgiving buffet that feeds 1,000 people in three seatings, the Harraseeket goes through 24 pumpkin pies, 24 apple pies, 24 maple-pecan pies, 24 banana pies, 35 cheesecakes, 18 chocolate mousse cakes and just 12 mincemeat pies.

What is the world coming to when people would rather have cheesecake than mincemeat on Thanksgiving?

The Harraseeket’s proprietor, Chip Gray, said even those few mincemeat pies are consumed mainly as “a nostalgia thing for older members of the family to bring to the table and say, ‘Aunt Gladys used to make this every Thanksgiving.’ Everyone who’s brave has a taste, and then eats the apple pie instead.”

Like me, Brooke Dojny, author of the “Dishing Up Maine” cookbook (Storey Publishing, 2006, $19.95), grew up eating mincemeat at Thanksgiving. But “now it’s almost gone from our repertoire because my sister and I are the only two who will go near it!” she said. “It’s one of those old-fashioned creations that served a purpose at the time, but the culinary world has moved on.”

Mincemeat pie, food historians agree, was first made centuries ago in England as a way to stretch a small amount of meat by adding fruit. The mixture was preserved with spices and rum or brandy. A 1961 edition of the culinary encyclopedia “Larousse Gastronomique” notes dryly that “mincemeat takes rather a long time to prepare, owing to the fact that it must steep for a month in Madeira, rum or brandy.”

According to Larousse, in the United States mincemeat has always included beef or venison, but in England, meat is no longer part of the recipe. Mince pie is still very popular in England, however. Its “absence from a Christmas dinner” there, Larousse states, “would be looked upon as a breach of the traditional rules.”

Today, in the U.S., “it’s mostly fruit and spices and very little meat,” said Robyn Bueltel, senior brand manager for None Such mincemeat, a ready-to-use brand of pie filling. “From eating it, you would never know that it has meat. You would never taste it and certainly would never see it.”

None Such still includes a “minuscule” amount of ground beef “so we can be true to the name,” Bueltel said.

Crosse & Blackwell, another well-known brand of mincemeat mix, is all fruit. The Harraseeket recipe includes venison along with fruit and spices. Boynton’s Market in Hallowell, Maine, which is renowned for its mincemeat, uses a recipe that includes beef.

Boynton’s sells the mix in plastic quart containers. “It’s mostly the older people who buy it,” says owner Karen Buck.

She hopes to entice younger customers to try it this year with “a few different things. We’ll probably cook up some pies, but also cookies and cakes. We even have a recipe for Mark Twain’s favorite mince cake.”

None Such also has developed recipes to encourage home cooks to incorporate mincemeat into dishes other than pies. The company offers recipes for mincemeat cookies, biscotti and even a sauce for chicken, combined with hot peppers.

But mincemeat’s name is not the only problem. Dojny thinks “tastes have evolved away” from flavors like cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice, and that they aren’t as popular as they used to be. “My children never liked spice cake or ginger cookies or anything like that,” she said. “Give them an Oreo and they were in heaven!”

I was pleased to find both None Such and Crosse & Blackwell in my local supermarket in New York, right next to the canned pumpkin pie filling. You can pour mincemeat filling from the jar into a pie crust, or you can buy a small brick of None Such condensed mincemeat mix and reconstitute it. My mother always used the brick, so in homage to her, I bought one.

I added fresh fruit, brandy and a few other ingredients, stewed it for a few minutes, then baked in a pie shell. Then I brought it to the office and offered it around.

Responses ranged from, “Um, I’m scared. Can it be a small taste?” to “Excellent. No beef aftertaste!” to “Lose three-quarters of the spices and the meat and we’ll have a great dessert.”

Two people tried it without knowing what it was. At first, they liked it, but after learning it was mincemeat, one of them couldn’t finish it.

Folks who’d had mincemeat before enjoyed it most, saying they particularly liked the sharp mix of sour, sweet, spice and brandy. But even they said things like, “I can’t remember when I last had a piece of mincemeat pie” and “I only have mincemeat once a year.”

One response gave me hope. “It just tastes like fruit pie,” the taster said. “I don’t know what I was expecting.”

So to all you mincemeat virgins out there, just give the pie a chance. You might be surprised to find you like it.

Mincemeat Pie

Makes 8 servings

1 box None Such condensed mincemeat mix

1/2 cup water

1/2 cup brandy

1/2 cup apple cider or juice

4 cups mixed fruit (such raisins and chopped apples and pears)

Drop of molasses

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1 prepared double-crust pie shell, not baked

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Combine the mincemeat mix, water, brandy, cider, fruit, molasses and nutmeg in a medium saucepan over a medium-low heat. Cook, stirring frequently, until the apples and pears are tender and the smell of liquor has dissipated, about 10 minutes. Do not boil.

Transfer the mixture to the pie shell. Place the top crust over the pie and seal the edges by pressing down on them with a fork. With a straw, make a tiny hole in the center of the top crust to allow steam to escape.

Bake until the crust is lightly browned, about 30 minutes. If the edges brown too quickly, cover them with foil.

Remove the pie from the oven and let stand 10 minutes. Best served warm.

(Note: For a simpler version of this pie, combine 2 boxes of None Such condensed mincemeat with 3 cups of water. Heat and stir until uniform, then transfer to a pie shell and bake. None Such and Crosse & Blackwell also sell ready-to-use mincemeat mix.)