Every currant hides a demon

Lowell Daily Citizen, February 10, 1879. A reminder that The Onion is nothing new under the sun, this mock temperance lecture (which is really pretty funny in a Twain-derivative fashion) is firmly grounded in reality: Temperance people and prohibitionists were squarely in the anti-mince camp, primarily though not exclusively owing to its alcoholic content. And as we’ve seen, they weren’t exactly wrong in regarding mince as a loophole in the enforcement of interdiction.

Pie-eyed

Kansas City Times, August 7, 1919. “One half of one percent” was the allowed alcohol content of “near-beer” under Prohibition. Mince at 14.12 % would definitely be more efficient.

Paging Dr. Foucault

Duluth News Tribune, January 3, 1916. Cosmically great headline.
Now I’m curious about venison-based mincemeat. Betcha it’s pretty good, what with the apples off-setting the gaminess of the meat and all.

Le helter skelter s’en vien

Kansas City Times, March 30, 1921.This Tridon was a Freudian and something of a grand fromage in spreading that gospel in New York. Seems he had some significant racial and dietary bees in his bonnet too.

Tasty pastry

Cleveland Plain Dealer, March 15, 1916. I wouldn’t have known that object in his meat hooks was mince pie. Looks more like a giant insect or grub. Reference to the “old southern colored woman” raises an interesting point: Although the mince pie in the U.S. originated in New England, by the late 19th century it was a national dish, popular in all sections and among black people as well as white. So I ask again: how did it so suddenly get demoted to a seasonal novelty food, on the same lowly footing as eggnog? It’s as if tomorrow everyone should suddenly and simultaneously grow tired of hamburgers or hotdogs, and then forget they were ever popular.
By the by, I just slipped out of bed and tiptoed down the hall to get myself a slice of mince pie from the icebox. I now feel full and in a sort of queasy communion with a bygone America.

Sorry?

Sunday Picayune, n.d. The mince pie joke ostensibly plays off this closing speech by Prospero in The Tempest:

Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air:
And like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capp’d tow’rs, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on; and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.

The hairpin gag eludes me entirely.

Arguably redundant

Baltimore Sun, March 26, 1892. Taking the uneasy way out.

Some frosting with that mince?

Tulsa Daily World, December 12, 1922. 1) I’m seeing a pattern here. 2) Even Mexican coke dealers were into mince pie. How the hell did it ever get knocked out of the box by apple?

This pie is dope!

Morning World Herald, February 14, 1901. “Being suspicious of something”–I love it. Thieving screw.

Pie post-mortem

Anaconda Standard, December 2, 1916. My mince pie experiment was surprisingly successful. Only 1 out of 10 volunteer subjects deemed it disgusting. Other responses ranged from “weird but good” to “really good.” I’m not sure that mince pie is poised for a comeback, but it does exert more persistent appeal than I would have thought.
P.S. One subject got back to me about a nightmare. Hers concerned an abrupt and unexpected obligation to sing showtunes onstage before a large audience. She rated it a 5 on a scale upon which 1 is emotionally neutral and 10 unbearable torment.