Category: Pastry

Dead Guy Activism

A regular reader (who’s calling himself “Vlad” this weekend) writes:

On behalf of the life impaired community, I wish to thank you for so eloquently highlighting an important point: that people without a pulse can still make a positive contribution to society. Those of us who are currently dealing with what is widely considered to be life’s ultimate disability thank you.

My pleasure, er…Vlad. Don’t forget I come from Chicago, a city famous for championing the rights of the deceased. Dead people have been voting there for decades.

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The Operation Called Mincemeat

I’m always more than willing to take a detour into history. Happily for me there’s an indirect connection between this week’s subject and one of the weirdest, most macabre stories of World War II: Operation Mincemeat. Since we’re closing in on Halloween, the story — a tale of how a dead guy helped misdirect the Nazis during one of the most important Allied invasions of the war — seems appropriate.

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Who was Fannie Farmer?

Ever since Julia Child’s death, food journalists, food celebrities, cookbook authors, bloggers and cultural historians have expended millions of keystrokes lionizing her. I’d say most if not all of that worshipful press is deserved. For Julia Child was a titan in the field of home cooking, having empowered millions of women — and more recently men — to attempt culinary feats once thought too difficult for the average Jane (or Joe).

Amid all these hagiographics, however, it’s important not to forget that Julia Child was but the latest in a line of innovators that have given us home cooking as we know it. That line — among English speakers anyway — stretches back to Hannah Glasse (author of The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy in 1747) and can be traced through Eliza Acton (Modern Cookery for Private Families, 1845) and Isabella Beeton (Beeton’s Book of Household Management, 1861) to Fannie Farmer, author of the Boston Cooking-School Cookbook.

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When Mincemeat was King

October was a big month for me as a boy. It was birthday time for my twin sister and me. Halloween came a week later, and right in between was the annual Pumpkin Festival in Sycamore, Illinois. Sycamore was over an hour away from our house in Hinsdale, but an old fraternity brother of my father’s was the pastor of the Episcopal church there. Culinarily speaking, that church was the epicenter of the whole festival, since it was there that the mincemeat was made.

It was an elaborate, highly clandestine operation. Dozens of women participated, however like a team of World War II code-breakers, none but the most senior had any concept of what they were doing. The recipe, you see, was a big BIG secret. Only one or two of the octogenarians working the kitchen actually knew the proportions. The rest of the team — which was mostly dedicated to peeling and chopping — was arrayed outside the church kitchen and not allowed through the doors. You’d have thought mad science of some kind was going on in there.

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What is suet?

More than happy to tell you all about it, Lucy! Suet is beef fat, but not just any sort of beef fat. It’s fat taken from right near the kidneys of the steer. It’s the mildest-tasting, easiest-melting fat on the animal, which is why it’s used for an application like mincemeat. The equivalent fat on a pig is known as leaf lard, and by no coincidence whatsoever it has also been prized by bakers over the centuries (I’m a big fan of it myself). Here’s what fresh suet looks like:

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When do you eat a mince pie?

Good question, reader Nicole! In Britain, around Christmas (traditions vary as to the most auspicious time to consume one, before Christmas or after, during the 12 Days). However mincemeat itself was/is traditionally made around October so the mincemeat has time to age. Mincemeat is an Autumn – New Year’s tradition in America.

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What is Mincemeat?

I wrote a little about this last week, but now that mincemeat is an official project, the subject bears a little more scrutiny. Someone who’s never heard of the stuff before might be forgiven for thinking it’s simply minced meat. But of course it isn’t. At least not these days. Meat hasn’t been a common ingredient in mincemeat for over 100 years.

The “mince” part of the name, well, that’s still accurate. Although I should mention that on this side of the pond we don’t use the word “mince” very much. We employ words like “grind”, “chop” and “shred” to the same end.

So what’s “minced” in mince meat?

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Next up: Mince Pies

I promised mincemeat…but other than eating it by the spoonful — which I’m not averse to — what do you do with it? Make a mince pie, that’s what. I haven’t eaten one of these since I lived in Britain, lo these many years ago. But even that pie was of the modern, meatless variety. […]

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