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Dessert

Black Currants for Tarts or Puddings

A preserve of black currants made with sugar, boiled and skimmed, suitable for tarts or puddings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Black currant and sugar work together. They rank in the top 22% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 393 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓

Black Currants for Tarts or Puddings

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the preserve

  1. Place the black currants in a preserving pan.

  2. Sprinkle 2 tablespoons of sugar over the currants and gently stir with a wooden spoon.

  3. Boil the mixture for 5 minutes.

  4. Remove from heat and mix in the remaining sugar.

  5. Return to heat and boil quickly for 15 minutes, stirring constantly and skimming off any scum.

  6. Optionally omit 8 ounces of sugar if desired.

Store

  1. Store covered with brandied paper in a dry place.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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.

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.

  1. Black currant + sugartop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together393 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Black currants
Provide the fruit, acidity and pectin that give the preserve its body and flavour.
Coarse white sugar
Sweetens the fruit and, at this quantity, helps preserve it and thicken the set.

The step that matters

Boil quickly for 15 minutes while stirring. Sugar must be fully dissolved before a rapid boil, and constant stirring prevents scorching on the base of the pan. Skimming removes scum so the preserve stays clear and the set forms properly.

“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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