Why it works: Red currant and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 26% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,156 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Currant-water Ice
Ingredients
Directions
Make the syrup
Boil the sugar with the water to create a syrup.
Combine and freeze
Combine the red currant juice with a few raspberries for color.
Mix the currant juice thoroughly with the syrup.
Strain the mixture into a mold and freeze for about 30 minutes.
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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Red currant + sugartop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,156 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Red currant juice
- Provides the tart, fruity flavor and the red color of the ice.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and lowers the freezing point, keeping the ice softer and less rock-hard.
The step that matters
Dissolve the sugar fully in the boiling water. Undissolved sugar crystals can remain gritty and unevenly sweet. Boiling the sugar with the water dissolves it into a uniform syrup before it is mixed with the juice.
“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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