The First Mince Pies!

The kitchen smells like Christmas this weekend.  Tony made fruit cake and stewed apples yesterday and I baked my first batch of mince pies and put some cheese and carrot puffs in the freezer for Wednesday when brother Rog and sister-in-law Anne (over briefly from their home in the States) plus brother Bob and Jen and Pete will join us on my evening of retirement for a meal.  I love that some baking makes me think of those who have contributed to it over the years.  The mincemeat in the pies is home made from Christine, Pete's mum (thank you Chris, very yummy and heaps better than the shop bought stuff!) and the trees on the pies were made with Tony's new cutter, brought over by Becks on her long weekend last week.  She and Rob (plus Davey and Izzy) had revisited the small town in Vermont where we went with them last Christmas, and returned to the hardware 'come everything' store which had the widest selection of pastry cutters we had ever seen together in one place.  Last year Tony came away with an apple cutter for his pies, this year Becky brought him several more for his collection.
In the background are a few cheese and carrot puffs ready to go into the oven for our lunch.  These always make me think of mum whose recipe (from an ancient Women's Weekly) is there on the worktop and who, everyone agrees, made the very best cheese and carrot puffs.