Why it works: Brandy and wine are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,427 recipes. Both carry gamma-nonanolactone, which smells coconut, sweet. The science ↓
Gooseberry Wine
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the juice
Top and tail the gooseberries, then mash them in a wooden dish using a rolling pin.
Transfer the mashed gooseberries to a large stone jar.
Pour boiling water over the mashed gooseberries, cover the jar, and let it stand for 12 hours.
Strain and measure the juice, then mix in ¾ pound of loaf sugar for each quart of juice.
Let the mixture stand for 8-9 hours, stirring several times to dissolve the sugar.
Ferment and clarify
Pour the mixture into a keg, allowing it to ferment at the bung-hole, topping it up with reserved liquid as it works out.
Once fermentation ceases, cover the keg tightly with a cloth around the bung.
Add 1 pint of white brandy for every gallon of gooseberry wine when sealing the keg.
After 4-5 months, bottle the wine, preferably in cold, frosty weather.
To refine, beat the egg whites with a small teaspoon of salt until frothy, then mix with a quart of wine and pour back into the cask.
After a few days, the wine will be fine and clear.
Bottle
Add 2-3 raisins to the bottom of each bottle to prevent further fermentation.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Brandy + winetop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,427 recipes
Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).
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Brandy + raisintop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,768 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Sugar + raisintop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,481 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Brandy + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,340 recipes
Shared aroma: acetoin (butter, cream).
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Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together11,939 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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
- Gooseberries
- Provide the fruit flavour and the juice that becomes the wine.
- Loaf sugar
- Feeds the yeast during fermentation and sets the sweetness and alcohol level.
- White brandy
- Adds spirit strength and helps keep the finished wine stable.
- Egg whites
- Bind suspended particles so they settle out, leaving the wine clear.
The step that matters
Adding the egg whites for refining. Egg whites must be beaten until frothy and mixed into the wine so they spread evenly; they carry fine haze particles down as they settle, clearing the wine.
Swap the raisin
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, brandy, wine, egg):
- Vanillafits better
- Apricotfits about as well
- Applefits about as well
- Raisinthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, brandy, wine, egg. 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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