A mince pie is a fruit-based mincemeat sweet pie of British origin that is
traditionally served during the Christmas season. Its ingredients are
traceable to the 13th century, when returning European crusaders brought
with them Middle Eastern recipes containing meats, fruits and spices.
The early mince pie was known by several names, including mutton pie, shrid pie
and Christmas pie. Typically its ingredients were a mixture of minced
meat, suet, a range of fruits, and spices such as cinnamon, cloves and
nutmeg. Served around Christmas, the savoury Christmas pie was associated
with supposed Catholic "idolatry" and during the English Civil War was frowned
on by the Puritan authorities. Nevertheless, the tradition of eating
Christmas pie in December continued through to the Victorian era, although
by then its recipe had become sweeter and its size reduced markedly from the
large oblong shape once observed. Today the mince pie remains a popular seasonal
treat enjoyed by many across the United Kingdom.
History = Britain =
The ingredients for the modern mince pie can be traced to the return of European
crusaders from the Holy Land. Middle Eastern methods of cooking, which
sometimes combined meats, fruits and spices, were popular at the time. Pies
were created from such mixtures of sweet and savoury foods; in Tudor England,
shrid pies were formed from shredded meat, suet and dried fruit. The addition
of spices such as cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg was, according to the English
antiquary John Timbs, "in token of the offerings of the Eastern Magi." Several
authors, including Timbs, viewed the pie as being derived from an old Roman
custom practised during Saturnalia, where Roman fathers in the Vatican were
presented with sweetmeats. Early pies were much larger than those consumed
today, and oblong shaped; the jurist John Selden presumed that "the coffin of
our Christmas-Pies, in shape long, is in Imitation of the Cratch [Jesus's crib]",
although writer T. F. Thistleton-Dyer thought Selden's explanation unlikely,
as "in old English cookery books the crust of a pie is generally called 'the
coffin.'" The modern mince pie's precursor was
known by several names. The antiquary John Brand claimed that in Elizabethan
and Jacobean-era England they were known as minched pies, but other names include
mutton pie, and starting in the following century, Christmas pie.
Gervase Markham's 1615 recipe recommends taking "a leg of mutton", and cutting
"the best of the flesh from the bone", before adding mutton suet, pepper, salt,
cloves, mace, currants, raisins, prunes, dates and orange peel. He also suggested
that beef or veal might be used in place of mutton. In the north of England,
goose was used in the pie's filling, but more generally neat's tongue was also
used; a North American filling recipe published in 1854 includes chopped
neat's tongue, beef suet, blood raisins, currants, mace, cloves, nutmeg, brown
sugar, apples, lemons, brandy and orange peel. During the English Civil War,
along with the censure of other Catholic customs, they were banned: "Nay, the
poor rosemary and bays, and Christmas pie, is made an abomination." Puritans
were opposed to the Christmas pie, on account of its connection with
Catholicism. In his History of the Rebellion, Marchamont Needham wrote "All
Plums the Prophets Sons defy, And Spice-broths are too hot; Treason's in a
December-Pye, And Death within the Pot." Some considered them unfit to occupy the
plate of a clergyman, causing Philo-Clericus to comment:
The Christmas-pie is, in its own nature, a kind of consecrated cake, and a badge
of distinction; and yet it is often forbidden, the Druid of the family.
Strange that a sirloin of beef, whether boiled or roasted, when entire is
exposed to the utmost depredeations and invasions; but if minced into small
pieces, and tossed up with plumbs and sugar, it changes its property, and
forsooth is meat for his master. In his essay The Life of Samuel Butler,
Samuel Johnson wrote of "an old Puritan, who was alive in my childhood ... would
have none of his superstitious meats and drinks." Another essay, published in the
December 1733 issue of The Gentleman's Magazine, explained the popularity of
"Christmas Pye" as perhaps "owing to the Barrenness of the Season, and the
Scarcity of Fruit and Milk, to make Tarts, Custards, and other Desserts",
but also possibly bearing "a religious kind of Relation to the Festivity from
which it takes its Name." The author also mentions the Quakers' objection to
the treat, "who distinguish their Feasts by an heretical Sort of Pudding, known
by their Names, and inveigh against Christmas Pye, as an Invention of the
Scarlet Whore of Babylon, an Hodge-Podge of Superstition, Popery, the Devil and
all his Works." Nevertheless, the Christmas pie remained a popular treat
at Christmas, although smaller and sweeter, and lacking in post-Reformation
England any sign of supposed Catholic idolatry. People began to prepare the
fruit and spice filling months before it was required, storing it in jars, and as
Great Britain entered the Victorian age, the addition of meat had, for many,
become an afterthought. Its taste then was broadly similar to that experienced
today, although some 20th-century writers continued to advocate the
inclusion of meat. Although the modern recipe is no longer
the same list of 13 ingredients once used, and lacks the religious meaning
contained therein, the mince pie remains a popular Christmas treat. Bakers Greggs
reported sales of 7.5 million mince pies during Christmas 2011. The popular claim
that the consumption of mince pies on Christmas Day is illegal is in fact an
urban myth. = New England =
Mincemeat pie was brought to New England by English settlers in the 17th century.
While it was originally a Christmas pie, as in Britain, the Puritans did not
celebrate Christmas, causing the pie's associations in the region to shift
toward the American holiday of Thanksgiving. The ingredients for New
England mincemeat pie are similar to the British one, with a mixture of apples,
raisins, spices, and minced beef serving as the filling. Later recipes sometimes
omit the beef, though "None Such", the major brand of condensed American
mincemeat, still contains beef. New England mincemeat pies are usually
full-sized pies, as opposed to the individual-sized pies now common in
Britain. See also
Christmas pudding List of fruit dishes
List of pies, tarts and flans Stir-up Sunday
References Footnotes
Notes Bibliography
Further reading