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 Currant Lozenges
Ingredients
Directions
The book says “a cool oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.
Prepare the currants
Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).
Place the currants in a jar.
Heat the jar in the oven until soft.
Pulp the currants through a fine sieve.
Make the mixture
In a saucepan, combine the pulp with the sugar and gelatine.
Boil the mixture for 30 minutes.
Remove from heat and stir in the sugar briskly.
Simmer for a little while after adding the sugar.
Dry and cut
Pour the mixture into plates about ½ inch thick.
Place the plates in the sun or a cool oven to dry.
Turn the lozenges.
Cut them into pieces.
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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Black currant + sugartop 22% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked 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 flavour, colour and natural pectin-free pulp that forms the body of the lozenge.
- Castor sugar
- Adds sweetness and, once concentrated, helps the mixture set into a firm, chewy texture.
- Cox’s instant gelatine
- Sets the pulp into a firm gel so the lozenges hold their shape when cut.
The step that matters
Stirring in the sugar after boiling. Sugar added to a hot fruit mixture can crystallise or scorch if not stirred briskly and kept moving. Stirring evenly dissolves the sugar and keeps the set consistent throughout the batch.
“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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