am I right to be annoyed so much by mince?

[ruthmollymummy]

surely 'mince' is a noun, so the meat I use to make my spaghetti should always be called, minced beef. Because it is, in fact, beef that has been minced.

Or is it alright to simply call it mince?

not a noun my goodness I am tired! A VERB!

mmm, hadn't considered this before you mentioned it ruthmollymummy...now it's bound to irritate me...
is it a bit the same as saying you'll have 'a coffee' as opposed to a cup of coffee ? I do hate the expression

Isn't 'minced' a participial adjective? It's in fairly common usage I think, such as in 'written apology'.

www.ucl.ac.uk/internet-grammar/adjectiv/particip.htm

Damn, I've confused myself now

mince is also a noun though if it helps

yep, I say it's a noun too.

it may have originally been a verb, but verbs do have a way of spawning nouns.

who can be bothered to say "we're having minced beef for tea" when they can just say "s'mince"?