Nutella mince pies, now this is a delightful way to shake up your festive routine. In our house, we always make a batch or two of mince pies, often on Christmas Eve, and they’re such a comforting nostalgic bake that I can’t see this changing any time soon. That being said, it’s fun to mix things up now and then and these are particularly great for those that maybe aren’t the biggest fans of mince pies…the nutella and hazelnut and orange pastry do a great job at mellowing the intenseness of the mincemeat. They are just delicious. Served hot is my favourite with these, maybe with cream or ice cream, why not, but they freeze brilliantly too. 

Happy baking. 

Ingredients

170g plain flour

85g unsalted butter (fridge cold)

pinch of salt

30g icing sugar

55g finely chopped hazelnuts

1 orange (zest)

1 large egg

3 tbsp Nutella

9 tbsp mincemeat 

Makes 18-24 star topped mince pies 

Method for nutella mince pies

First, let’s make the pastry. In a food processor pour your flour, salt, fridge cold butter and icing sugar and pulse until the butter is combined and it resembles fine bread crumbs. 

Finely chop the hazelnuts.

Add in the orange zest, hazelnuts and the egg and pulse to combine until you have a ball of dough. 

Flatten slightly, wrap in cling film and chill in the fridge for about 30 minutes or longer if you have it, to allow the pastry to rest. 

Spoon in the mincemeat and nutella into a bowl and stir to combine. 

Preheat your oven to 200°C and place a baking tray in the oven to heat up too. (This will help the bottoms of the pies cook evenly)

Cut your pastry in half and wrap up one portion to use later.  Begin to roll out the pastry in a circle until it’s roughly ¼ inch thick. Cut out circles to match the size of your shallow pie tins. Then add a tsp of filling and top with stars. (Dabble the edges of the pastry cases to help the stars stick to the sides.)

Let’s get baking

Then brush the tops with egg or milk and bake in a hot oven for about 12 minutes. 

Continue rolling and filling the cases until you have used all the pastry. 

Once the mince pies come out of the oven, place them on a wire rack to cool and then dust with icing sugar to serve. 

These freeze really well, so you can batch them up and defrost and eat whenever you fancy and will last a few months.  If you’re eating them straight away, they’ll keep for 2-3 days in an airtight container. 

Tip

To flash freeze, put the pies on a baking tray (that’ll fit in your freezer) on a single layer and freeze for about an hour, to flash freeze. Then you can pop them all in a bag after that. 

Looking for more festive baking ideas? Try our Mince pie Christmas cupcakes, Mince pie cookies; Chocolate nutella muffins – with a crunchie topping, or our Fruit and nut fudge; all delicious and Christmassy. Perfect for the holidays.