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Dessert

Spiced Currants

A preserved sweet and spiced currant mixture made with brown sugar, cinnamon, cloves, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Spiced Currants

about 5 pints

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the currants and remove any stems.

Cook and jar

  1. In a large pot, combine the currants, brown sugar, cinnamon, cloves, and vinegar.

  2. Boil gently for 2 hours, stirring occasionally.

  3. Once done, pour into sterilized jars, making about 5 pints.

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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Currant + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together693 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  4. Currant + cinnamontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Currant + clovetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

Sugar and cinnamon 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

Currants
Provide the main fruit body and bulk of the finished spiced currants.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and body, and helps the mixture thicken as it cooks.
Vinegar
Adds sharp acidity that balances the sugar and helps preserve the fruit.
Cinnamon
Adds warm, sweet aroma and flavour to the fruit.
Cloves
Adds a strong, pungent aroma and warm flavour to the fruit.

The step that matters

Boil gently and stir occasionally. As the mixture cooks down over 2 hours, sugar and fruit concentrate and can stick and scorch on the base of the pot. Occasional stirring keeps heat even and prevents a burnt taste.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cinnamon, clove, vinegar):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Quincefits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cinnamon, clove, vinegar. 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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