Why it works: Black currant and cinnamon share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 28 recipes. Both carry 4-methoxybenzaldehyde, which smells sweet, anise. The science ↓
Black Currant Cordial
Ingredients
Directions
Make the infusion
Infuse the black currants, leaves, and cinnamon in the alcohol for three weeks.
Strain the mixture.
Finish the cordial
Dissolve the sugar in the water and add it to the strained infusion.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.
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Black currant + cinnamontop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together28 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).
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Cinnamon + sugartop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together30,779 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Black currant + sugartop 22% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together393 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Cinnamon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Black currants
- Supply the main fruit flavor and aroma to the infused alcohol.
- Black currant leaves
- Add a green, aromatic note that deepens the currant flavor.
- Cinnamon
- Adds warm, aromatic spice that rounds out the fruit flavor.
- Alcohol
- Extracts flavor compounds from the fruit, leaves, and cinnamon during the long infusion.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and balances the acidity and alcohol in the cordial.
The step that matters
Strain the mixture after three weeks. Leaving solids in the infusion can make the cordial taste bitter or cloudy over time. Straining after the full infusion removes plant material while keeping the extracted flavor in the liquid.
Swap the black currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cinnamon, sugar):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Figfits better
- Black currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against cinnamon, sugar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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