Christmas simply isn’t Christmas for me without mince pies – after all, they’re one of the few treats that aren’t now available all year round. Good as the shop-bought ones are, homemade are better by miles. Even if you don’t make your own mincemeat, thanks to a few clever tricks in this recipe, a decent quality jar produces great results.
There are small balls of marzipan hidden at the bottom of each pie, which melt into the mincemeat in the oven, giving the pies a nice almond flavour. If you don’t like marzipan though, or are allergic to nuts, simply leave them out. You could even mix a chopped apple into the mincemeat instead for a fruity flavour and make the mincemeat stretch that little bit further.
Don’t be put off by making the pastry for these, I use a food processor to do all the hard work, as it means you don’t have to handle the dough and helps keep the butter cool. The lemon zest gives a nice zing to cut through the richness, and the mix of self-raising and plain flours means the pastry is short, but fluffy and light too. Do make sure you use real butter though; using margarine results in soggy pastry, and is defeating the point, especially at this time of year. If you can’t indulge at Christmas, when can you?
These are at the best when still warm from the oven, dredged in a snow-drift of icing sugar, and topped with some clotted cream.