Why it works: Currant and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 26% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,256 recipes. The science ↓
Currant Jelly
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the juice
Wash the currants and spread them on a dish in the sun to dry.
Place the dried currants in a stone crock and set the crock in boiling water until the currants are soft.
Strain the mixture through a flannel bag or a fine sieve, pressing all the juice out.
Make the jelly
For every pint of juice, add 1 pound of the best loaf sugar.
Boil the mixture for 20 minutes, but not longer.
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.
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Currant + sugartop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together12,256 recipes
Currant and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,256 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
- Currants
- Provide the pectin and acidity that give the jelly its set and tang.
- Loaf sugar
- Sweetens the juice and helps the jelly thicken and set as it cooks.
The step that matters
Boil for 20 minutes, but not longer. Boiling too long can break down the pectin and reduce the jelly's ability to set, while stopping too early can leave it too loose.
“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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