Advent - Day 11

Now we're getting on to the good food stuff - mince pies! I am a relatively recent convert to these having spent many years worrying (as all good vegetarians should) about something containing 'mince meat'. Then, of course, even once I knew that it was just a strange way of describing dried fruit, there was the problem of beef suet. Well, all these clouds have been blown away and, thanks to the glory of vegetable suet, I can munch my way through mince pies with the best of them. Miles is the chief mince pie maker in his family and I helped him make them last year. This year we have gone a step further and made our own pear and ginger mince meat (so I can definitely confirm, no animals were harmed in the making of our pies).

However, the mince meat is still in its jars so no pictures from our kitchen yet, although hopefully there will be later. The picture at the top is from the BBC Good Food website and shows Apricot and Hazelnut Mince Pies. The recipe looks interesting and doesn't require the mince meat to be stored to let the flavours develop, making for a much quicker process. Maybe one for next year if the pear and ginger doesn't work out!