Bidding for the Mince Pie Project starts at midday today. Now in its third year, the annual charity event brings together 100 of the UK's best chefs for a Christmas auction. Each of the participating chefs is asked to create two boxes of their own Christmas mince pies. The first boxes are then auctioned and the others are raffled off. The proceeds from this year's project will be evenly split between two charities: Kids Company & FoodCycle.
Whilst the lineup of chefs is all-star, a few participating chefs that caught our eyes include Michel Roux Jr, Jason Atherton, Neil Rankin, Marcus Wareing, Tom Aikens, Raymond Blanc, Atul Kochhar, Claire Smyth, Sat Bains and Anna Hansen.
Hot Dinners were fortunate to taste a few of entries for this year and were very impressed by the standard and creativity of the entries. All the entries we tried were of course excellent, however we did have a few favourites which we think will be popular picks this year.
1. Neil Rankin, Smokehouse - 'Bacon, bourbon, butterscotch'. A southern take on the mince pie, Rankin has created a cinnamon and bacon sugar puff pastry and filled it with unctuous bacon and bourbon mincemeat before finally dipping it in bourbon butterscotch.
2. Anna Hansen, The Modern Pantry - 'Apple, almond & kumquat'. In her signature style, Hansen brings together East and West flavours to create a pie which is both exotic and familiar, the addition of brandied sloe & kumquat a nice touch.
3. Atul Kochhar, Benares - 'Mince Pie Samosas'. Perhaps one of the more off-piste entries, Kochhar brings together the crispy pastry and spiced fruit mince with surprising ease. Indian grandmothers may not approve of this, but we definitely do.
Bidding opens at midday on Friday 6 December 2013 and closes at midday on Friday 13 December 2013.
For updates, visit www.themincepieproject.com or follow @mincepieproject on Twitter.
Follow Louis Fernando on Twitter at @tuckandvine and on his websiteTuck & Vine. Photos by Kate Beard.
