Chocolate and Ginger Mince Pies

First up; lightly grease a 8 hole muffin tray. Place the flour, Cocoa Powder and sugar in a bowl and mix until all combined. Add the butter to the bowl and rub into the dry ingredients until the form a breadcrumb consistency.

Add the egg yolk and stir through so the mixture begins to clump together. Add the milk and Orange Extract and using your fingers begin to bring pastry dough together. Pour the pastry dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead lightly to form a smooth dough. If you have a food processor you can blitz your pastry together in the processor.

Thinly roll the pastry out onto a lightly floured surface. Using a round  (approx. 10cm) cutter slightly larger than your bun tray cut 8 circles out of the pastry, re-rolling as necessary. Place the circles of pastry in the bun tray a press into place. If your pastry cracks don’t worry just inch it back together and smooth out.

Place the pastry cases in the fridge to chill whist the make your filling. Re-roll the remaining pastry and cut out 8 stars to cover the top of your mince pies and place on a piece of greaseproof paper and set to one side.

It’s time to make the minemeat filling; pop all the ingredients except the suet, sugar and Chocolate Chunks into a bowl. Leave for an hour to allow the dried fruit to absorb the orange juice and spiced rum. Once the dried fruits looks plump mix in the suet, sugar and Chocolate Chunks. It is best to make your mincemeat a few days in advance and allow the flavours to deepen, simply store the mincemeat in a jar in the fridge until needed.

Preheat the oven to 200℃/180℃/Gas Mark 6. Remove your pastry case from the fridge and add a spoonful of filling to each pastry case. Place a pastry star on top of each mince pie and brush with an egg of milk glaze.

Pop into the oven and bake for 25-30 minutes. Remove from the oven and leave to cool in the tin for 20 minutes before teasing each pie gently out of the cupcake tray with a teaspoon or palette knife.

Whilst your mince pies are colling, decorate 8 chocolate stars with some gold writing icing for a hint of Christmas sparkle. Once cooled pipe a small blob of gold writing icing on top of the pastry star and stick your decorated chocolate star on top!

Sprinkle over some icing sugar and serve for a fabulous festive treat!