One source, Johnston's Place names of Scotland, 1892, theorizes Minch is from the Norse megin nös (great ness)or megin nish, shortened to min-nish, and corrupted to Minch. On the other hand,in the Concise Scots Dictionary, minch is equivalent to mince, and therefore "what care we how white the minch is" may mean, "we are so starving that we are going to eat that meat pie, whether it is completely baked or not."