Thanks, OK, I thought you would know. Although I never left home until I married, I just don't remember everything that Grandma did with her canning.
I never have managed to 'copy' her mincemeat recipe, she was German-Dutch and the recipe died with her. Not other family member alive today tasted her mincemeat that could help me. She used suet, gooseberries, and in the adult version, brandy. DD discovered my cooking brandy the last time she was here with her dh, much to their enjoyment...I have been known for a long married life of a 'dry' and free of any liquor in the house. But to every rule there's an exception and mincemeat attempts were the exception. An incident of three young cousins losing their parents and youngest member of their family to a 'drunken driver' when I was a teenager made an impression on me that I have never forgotten. It was later proven that the driver had suffered a heart attack and it was the combination of being at the wrong place at the wrong time killed them all. That is why it was called an 'accident'. The three children got excellent settlement from it but it never made up for the lost of the their parents and youngest sibling of four years old. So I learned at an early age how life could change in a moment of time.
Celebrate life. Enjoy your loved ones.