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Dessert

Red-gooseberry Jam

A jam made from ripe red gooseberries, red currants, and sugar, sealed with brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Red currant and brandy work together. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 105 recipes. Both carry isoamyl acetate, which smells banana, pear. The science ↓

Red-gooseberry Jam

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Remove the tops and stems from the gooseberries and strip the currants from their stems.

  2. Place the fruit in a preserving kettle over low heat, stirring frequently to prevent burning.

Cook the jam

  1. When the fruit begins to break down, add the sugar and continue boiling while stirring almost constantly.

  2. Boil steadily for about 30 minutes, or until a small amount cooled on a saucer reaches the proper consistency.

Jar and seal

  1. Partly cool the jam, then transfer it to jars or glasses.

  2. Once the jam is completely cold, place a piece of paper soaked in brandy on top of each jar and seal them airtight.

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. Red currant + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together105 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  2. Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Red currant + sugartop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,156 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

Sugar and brandy barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,939 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

Red gooseberries
Provide the main fruit body, tartness and natural pectin that help the jam set.
Red currants
Add extra pectin and tart acidity that support a firm set and bright flavour.
Sugar
Sweetens the jam and, with boiling, thickens it and helps preserve it.

The step that matters

Boiling to the proper consistency. Sugar must be added once the fruit has softened, and the jam must boil long enough for pectin and sugar to reach the set point. Too little cooking leaves it runny, while overcooking can make it stiff and dull in flavour. The saucer test shows when it is ready.

Swap the red currant

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Red currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, brandy. 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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