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 Wine
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the fruit
Stem and mash the currants.
Strain the mashed currants into a clean container.
Ferment
Add ½ pint of water and less than 1 pound of sugar to the fruit.
Stir the mixture well.
Pour into a clean cask, leaving the bung-hole open or covered with lace.
Let it stand for a month to ferment.
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 juice, flavor and acidity that the wine is built on.
- Sugar
- Feeds the fermenting yeast, producing alcohol and carbon dioxide, and leaves some sweetness.
The step that matters
Leaving the bung-hole open or covered with lace. Fermentation releases carbon dioxide gas. An open or lace-covered vent lets the gas escape without pressure building in the cask, while the covering keeps out dust and insects.
“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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