Why it works: Sugar and red currant 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 ↓
Strawberries
Ingredients
Directions
Make the syrup
Combine sugar and water (or currant juice) in a preserving kettle and bring to a boil, skimming constantly until it thickens.
Carefully add strawberries and boil gently for about 15 minutes, or until the fruit is tender.
Pour the mixture into a basin, ensuring the strawberries remain whole, and let it sit overnight.
Finish and set
Drain the juice from the strawberries and return it to the kettle, boiling until it reaches a jelly-like consistency.
Gently add the strawberries back into the kettle and boil for 5 to 10 minutes, keeping them intact.
Transfer the preserve into small glasses or pots and let them stand uncovered for a week.
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.
-
Sugar + red curranttop 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
- Fine lump sugar
- Sweetens the fruit and, at high concentration, helps the preserve thicken and keep.
- Fresh strawberries
- Provide the fruit flavour, colour and the body of the preserve.
- Water or red currant juice
- Dissolves the sugar and carries the fruit's pectin and acidity into the syrup.
The step that matters
Boiling the drained juice to a jelly-like consistency. Sugar and pectin only set when concentrated enough, so the juice must be boiled until it thickens; underboiling leaves a runny preserve, while overboiling can darken and toughen the fruit.
“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.
You might also like
Red Currant Jelly65 recipes
Currant Ice Cream32 recipes
Currant Sherbet9 recipes
Currant and Raspberry Ice7 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.