The best mince pie pastry ever? 29 November 2006 at 8:13AM in Old style MoneySaving 553 replies 190K views

researcher

My elderly neighbour has at last given me her recipe for her mince pies. Do try it, I promise you will be surprised by how excellent it is. I will reproduce it exactly as she taught me yesterday.

Yield - 3 dozen pies.

1 lb Self raising Flour
8 oz Trex
4 oz caster sugar
1 egg
little water

2 jars mincemeat.

Rub fat into flour and sugar until resembling fine breadcrumbs. Lightly beat the egg, and mix in with a knife adding a little water. Resulting paste should be smooth and soft and very pliable. No need to rest in fridge.

Roll out thinly, you will need plenty of flour as the pastry is quite sticky - this is correct as it will 'thicken' slightly when cooking.

Line your mince pie tins with the pastry (greased with trex), we used a pallett knife and place a spoonful of mince in each, place on pastry tops and seal gently with finger tips (no added liquid necessary). Be careful, this pastry is soft to work with.

Cook at appx 180/90c until lightly golden. (Appx 20 - 25 mins, but will depend on your oven).

Leave pies in tins to cool for a few minutes and then place a wire rack on top and tip over - tap the bottoms of each pie and they will slip out. (Don't attempt to hook out with a knife - they will break!) Then you can turn them up the right way to cool.

Sprinkle with a little sugar if preferred.

This pasty will be crisp, yet crumbly - keeps and freezes exceptionally well and her pies are legendary - she is asked to make 100's each year.

Happy eating

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oldMcDonald

What is Trex? Never heard of it before and google just gave me loads of info on big scarey dinosaurs!

Pretty sure it's not that?

researcher

It's a vegetable fat (white) - you'll find it in the cold cabinet near to the butters

oldMcDonald

Thanks. Will give this a try, have only made pastry once before and it was a disaster so hopefully I can do better with this!

janetmw

All about TREX here

Janet

earthmother

Thanks for this - was given a very posh jar of mincemeat and didn't want to waste it on my normal pastry - will give this one a go instead.

researcher

Let me know how you all get on.

I had a couple for 11's - but I have managed to freeze 18.

Alfietinker

Do you have to use Trex or can I use a mixture of butter/lard or all butter? Does everything have to be cold like nomal pastry or is this fool proof? I'm not very good with pastry.

echo

alfietinker i've a recipe taken from Nigella's book and she uses same amount of cold unsalted butter as the trex.think i'd stick with this recipe unless somebody out there has experimented.i've used her recipe before and it was ok.by using the trex it gives the pastry a crispyness.tis best if the pastry is cold ( i shove mine in the fridge) and if you have cool hands-never a prob with me.

researcher how is this pastry to roll out? i ask cos sometimes i use an ordinary recipe ( half marg/half lard) but change the quantities slightly and add an egg.bloody awful to roll out when i've added an egg.

loren83

I've never made pastry before, do you think I'd be ok with this? We've already gone through dozens of mince pies in our house so far this year.

Do you need individual tins like you get in the ready made packets?

earthmother

loren83 wrote:

I've never made pastry before, do you think I'd be ok with this? We've already gone through dozens of mince pies in our house so far this year.

Do you need individual tins like you get in the ready made packets?

I find that pastry is easy so long as it doesn't get too warm - I find it much easier than cake (sponges are the bane of my life)

You want a fairy cake/bun tray - just look in the cooking section of somewhere like Wilkinsons - it's the one with about a dozen little cups in the one tray - should only be a couple of pounds.



I had a lovely old one a few years back where the cups were fluted, so the pastry was a bit fancier when you turned it out - got lost in a move though - never found similar since