Skip to main content
Dessert

To Bottle Red Currants

A method for preserving red currants by bottling them with sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 2 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

To Bottle Red Currants

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Carefully cut the currants from the stalks without breaking the skins.

  2. Place the currants into clean, dry quart bottles.

  3. As you fill each bottle, add 2 ounces of sugar gradually using a teaspoon.

Seal and store

  1. Fill the bottles completely and seal with corks.

  2. Store the bottles in a rack with the necks downwards to prevent contact with damp walls.

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 + sugartop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked 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 currants
Supply the tart fruit and juice that fills the bottles and gives the preserve its main flavor.
Loaf sugar
Sweetens the tart currants and helps preserve the fruit's flavor and texture.

The step that matters

Fill the bottles completely and seal with corks. Air left in the bottle gives microorganisms oxygen to grow, and fruit exposed to air can spoil or mold. Filling to the top and sealing well limits this exposure.

“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 JellyRed Currant Jelly65 recipesCurrant Ice CreamCurrant Ice Cream32 recipesCurrant SherbetCurrant Sherbet9 recipesCurrant and Raspberry IceCurrant and Raspberry Ice7 recipes