Sesame star mince pies (gluten-free)

I made these two years ago, but did not make them completely gluten free (used plain flour instead of the gram/rice mix). I really liked the pastry though - much more interesting than normal pastry. This time I went the whole hog and they are fully GF. The source of the recipe has now truly disappeared into the ether, but I found it somewhere on the internet back then.

(these quantities make 12, when bases cut using Coke glass and baked in regular-sized bun tin)

50g ground almonds
60g cooked chickpeas, mashed to a stiff paste
100g gluten-free plain flour (or 50g gram flour, 50g rice flour)
2 tbsp sesame seeds
40g margarine (or cold-pressed plain sesame or safflower oil)
water, to bind
1 400g jar of mincemeat

Combine seeds, ground almonds, flour and ground chickpeas. Rub in fat and mix with a fork. Add a little water to combine. Rest in the fridge 30min.

Heat oven to 400F / 200C. Roll out the pastry to about 2 mm thick and cut into rounds for pie bases (deep fill used tall plastic measure beaker / normal size used Coke glass). Put bases into bun / muffin tin. Fill with mincemeat or a mixture of mincemeat and cooked apple. Cut out stars (I freehanded) and put them on the tops. Bake for 20-35 min, til lightly browned and crisp. Leave to cool before trying to remove from trays.


The mincemeat I made 2 years ago was still in good nick, so that's what I used for these. I did see mincemeat in Stop n Shop the other day though, for future reference. The pastry was perhaps relatively brittle due to the use of GF flours, but it rolled out OK. I'm wondering if the gram flour was a mistake: it does have quite a pungent taste. Truth will be in the eating - they are cooling right now.

They are good! The pastry is nice and crunchy and robust, and delicious in combination with the mincemeat. The gram taste has baked out. The pastry isn't like regular mince pie pastry, but I think it's better.

Only thing is, the combo of the GF pastry (which cracks quite easily) and the runnier than normal mincemeat (because I used booze instead of fat to preserve it) means the liquid has seeped through the bottoms of a few of the pies and they were kind of welded onto the pans... still came off, but a couple lost a small part of the base. I guess I could have taken more care cutting them out and getting them into the tins...


Note: these freeze (baked) very well: can basically eat them straight from the freezer.