This year we had some splendid home-made mince pies, which Bob produced. In 30 years of married life, I don't think I have ever made my own -believing he didn't like them- but in fact it is just the candied peel, without that, they are fine apparently.
However along the way this year, I managed to acquire a few boxes of bought pies as well, as many kind visitors dropped in during December and donated them, and now there's just one box of 18 left.
The use by date is February - but I cannot face eating them [and Bob just won't ] and I have offered them around but everyone else seems to have had enough. I cannot just throw them away...
My question is, what can I do with them?
Delia and co are always coming up with recipes for left over Christmas Pud [brick-pastry 'crackers'], Christmas Cake [boozy trifles] and Panettone [upmarket bread and butter pudding] And the "remaining bits of turkey" recipes go on forever.
But I have yet to see a recipe for leftover mince pies. There is a great cake recipe in the Cranks Book requiring 'a leftover jar of mincemeat' - but what about actual left over pies?
I did wonder about dismantling them, pulverising the pastry shells in a processor, and then putting half of that sandy mix in a square baking tin, spreading the mincemeat on top, then finally a top layer of more pastrycrumbs. Then cutting it all into neat fingers. But Bob said that was a daft idea - it is somewhat akin to buying new fabric, cutting it into squares and sewing it together to make patchwork.
Could I discard the pastry [but what a waste!] and use the filling in the Cranks Cake? Seems a lot of effort.
If this awfully cold weather continues, is it appropriate food to put out for wild birds? Or will it attract rats?
I'm sure I am not the only woman who seems to get stressed about mince pies - in "I Don't Know How She Does It", Alison Pearson's heroine Kate [who is juggling marriage, family and work responsibilities] has a bad moment when she gets back from a business trip to Sweden...
"Monday, 1:37 a.m. How did I get here? Can someone please tell me that? Not in this kitchen, I mean in this life. It is the morning of the school carol concert and I am hitting mince pies. No, let us be quite clear about this, I am distressing mince pies, an altogether more demanding and subtle process.
Discarding the packaging, I winkle the pies out of their foil cups, place them on a chopping board and bring down a rolling pin on their blameless floury faces. This is not as easy as it sounds, believe me. Hit the pies too hard and they drop a kind of fat-lady curtsy, skirts of pastry bulging out at the sides, and the fruit starts to ooze. But with a firm downward motion… you can start a crumbly little landslide, giving the pastry a pleasing homemade appearance. And homemade is what I'm after here. Home is where the heart is. Home is where the good mother is, baking for her children.
All this because of a letter Emily brought back from school asking if "parents could please make a voluntary contribution of appropriate festive refreshments" for the Christmas party. The note is printed in berry red and at the bottom, next to Miss Empson's signature, there is a snowman wearing a shy grin. But do not be deceived by the strenuous tone of informality or the outbreak of chummy exclamation marks!!! Oh, no. Notes from school are written in code, a code buried so cunningly in the text that it could only be deciphered at Bletchley Park or by guilty women in the advanced stages of sleep deprivation…
Take that word "parents," for example. When they write parents what they really mean ...is mothers. (Has a father who has a wife on the premises ever read a note from school? Technically, it's not impossible, I suppose, but the note will have been ... an invitation to a party that has taken place at least ten days earlier.) And "voluntary?" Voluntary is teacher-speak for "On pain of death and/or your child failing to gain a place at the senior school of your choice." As for "appropriate festive refreshments," these are definitely not something bought by a lazy cheat in a supermarket".
I just love the idea of 'distressing mince pies'!
Signs of Christmas are almost gone [apart from the snow outside, of course] but lurking in the dining room, I found one solitary cracker
Term has started again, and life is back to 'normal' - whatever that means round here!
Feeding the birdies is a good plan: http://www.howtodothings.com/food-drink/how-to-feed-the-birds-at-christmas
ReplyDeleteOr you could just force them down with a big dollop of clotted cream! :)
Do birds EAT clotted cream??!!
ReplyDeletecan you freeze them? I like your idea about re-construction - can you make some sort of slice/bar type thing, maybe with a layer of caramelly goo?
ReplyDeleteA sort of millionaire's shortbread thing - that's an interesting thought. Thanks !
ReplyDeleteYou could freeze them, but would you ever really feel like eating them again?!
ReplyDeleteThe birds would love them, but put them up on a birdtable, rather than on the ground.
I chopped up the last of our mince pies and put them out for the birds yesterday, and they seem to have all but disappeared (the pies, not the birds). I got the idea from a programme recently where Kate Humble was putting out left over Christmas pudding for the birds, saying that they needed the fat in them when the weather is as cold as it is at the moment, and as we know, there is plenty of fat in a mince pie!
ReplyDeleteHappy New Year, Angela.
Helen x
Lol, yes the birds they won't eat mince pies without a good dollop of cream and a sherry. It's all the rage in the bird world.
ReplyDeleteuse them in a trifle or mince pie fridge cake:
ReplyDelete300g dark chocolate 4 chopped mince pies 1 orange zested and 50g of pecans roudhly chopped. line a 20cm x 20cm tin. melt half the chocolate and when melted pour into the bottom of the tin put in the fridge to set. melt remaining chocolate add mince pies orange zest and nuts, stirring gently so it does not turn to mush. pour over the layer of chocolate, then return to the fridge to chill until firm. turn out onto a chopping board with chocolate side facing up and cut into 12 squares.