Making Paul Hollywood‘s mince pies from the BBC’s Great British Baking Show’s holiday special should have been easy. It was more like a blind bake. Mincemeat pies say “Christmas” to Reg so I wanted to make him some for that special time of year. I had to make some alterations to the recipe to get it to work so here is my version with clear instructions and baking advice.
The Ingredients
You will need: 1 large jar mincemeat (600g but get a smaller one if you can find it or use 2/3 of the jar to avoid unused filling), 2 segmented clementines, 1 finely chopped apple, zest of clementines, a little icing sugar, 375g all purpose flour, 260g softened unsalted butter, 125g sugar plus extra for sprinkling, 1 large egg (2 if flour is too dry) and 1 beaten egg for glazing.
The Dough
Place the flour and butter in a large bowl.
Rub together to a crumb consistency.
Add the sugar and the egg, and mix together.
You are supposed to bring the dough together at this point and fold together but there was no way it was going to work, way too dry, so I added another egg.
Tip out onto a lightly floured surface and fold until the pastry comes together, be careful not to over mix. Wrap the pastry in plastic wrap and chill for 10 minutes.
The Filling
Scoop the mincemeat into a bowl and add the clementines, apple and zest. I would use 2/3 of the jar to avoid having a ton of leftover filling like I had.
Making The Pies
Heat oven to 220C/425F. Now he does not say to grease your muffins tins but trust me, do so!!! Also grease the tops because the egg wash is going to burn, burn, burn.
Roll out the pastry to 3mm thick. Using a round cutter (about 10 cm), cut out 12 bases and place them into muffin trays. He says to cut out 16 but I did not have enough dough.
Put 1 1/2 tbsp mincemeat mixture into each.
Brush the edge of each pie with a little beaten egg.
Re-roll the pastry to cut 7 cm lids and press them on top to seal.
Glaze with the rest of the egg wash, sprinkle with sugar, then make a small cut in the tops.
Baking
Bake mince pies for 15-20 minutes until golden brown.
Leave to cool before releasing them from the muffin trays. Even with the greasing of the pans, getting these out was not easy! A lot of them would not come out. I recommend using a small spatula to go around the rim to loosen the pies before they cool.
Foodie Results
This is how I think of mince pies but Paul Hollywood says to dust with icing sugar so I did…
OK, these were delicious but that recipe did not have clear instructions, there was not enough moisture for the dough, there was too much filling and/or not enough pastry…!!!
If you make them my way they should be painless and appreciated by those who want that beautiful crumbling pie with that traditional filling. I will give Paul Hollywood credit. Adding fresh fruit helped take an old traditional recipe and liven it up with bright beautiful flavours.
Gawd, I love mincemeat tarts and pies. It simply is NOT Christmas without them.
Oh good! Well if you actually want to make them, these are pretty awesome. I’m not a huge fan and I enjoyed them and Reg absolutely agrees with you.
Thank you for your recipe! I just watched the Christmas BBShow and wanted to make the ones on the show with pears and figs that look so good!
Imagine my delight that my English friend is having us over for tea in two days serving mincemeat pies she brought with her! Mmmmmmm I will try to make my own, maybe watch the show again… I love how yummy your crust looks.. (-:
Carole, you are so welcome! My pleasure. Sounds like you have love of mincemeat pie inspiration around you. I gotta say, the crust is fantastic! Enjoy and Happy Holidays!
Just made your version of Paul’s mince pies. Great results i made them to his recipe last year, and didn’t really have any problems.but loved your photos. Helps a lot.
One thing. I . brushed the underside of each lid with egg, they stick onto the base perfectly, and you don not have so much egg all over the pan.doesn’t seem to get down the sides much. Worked for me, anyway. Chris