We made a couple of versions of mincemeat using the Pear Mincemeat recipe in this book as a guide. The other versions we made were, apple mincemeat and a combination apple-pear mincemeat. They taste wonderful in pastry, phyllo or straight from the jar.
1 cup dried currants
1 cup golden raisins
1/2 cup dried apricots, coarsely chopped
1 lemon the juice and the zest
1 orange the juice and the zest
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground ginger
a pinch of salt
10 cups of pears, peeled, cored. (treat to prevent browning drain liquid before adding)
1 cup almonds, slivered and blanched
1/4 Myers’s Jamaican rum
In a large stainless steel pot, combine the currants, raisins, apricots,lemon zest and juice, orange zest and juice, brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and salt. Add the drained pears to the pot and fold gently into the dried fruit and spice mixture. try not to bruise or break the pears. Bring to a boil over a medium high heat. Lower the heat and cover, boil gently for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally until slightly thickened. Uncover and cook until it is thick enough to mound on a spoon about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the almonds.
Ladle hot mincemeat into hot jars leaving 1/2 headspace. Remove air bubbles and adjust headspace by adding more hot mincemeat. Wipe jar rims. Center lids on jars. Screw the jar bands to finger-tip tight.
Place the jars into prepared canner. making sure jars are covered with 1-2 inches of water. Bring to a boil and process for 20 minutes. Remove canner lid. Wait 5 minutes, then remove jars, cool and store.
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