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Currant Sauce

A sauce made from currants, sugar, vinegar, cinnamon, and spices, boiled slowly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Currant Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine currants, sugar, vinegar, cinnamon, and spices in a large pot.

  2. Boil the mixture slowly for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.

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. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Currant + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together693 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  3. Currant + cinnamontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

  5. Vinegar + cinnamontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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 main fruit flavor and tartness, and their natural pectin helps the sauce thicken as it cooks.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and, as it dissolves and concentrates, helps preserve the sauce and give it body.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the fruit flavor and balances the sugar.
Cinnamon
Contributes warm, aromatic spice flavor to the sauce.

The step that matters

Boil the mixture slowly for 1 hour, stirring occasionally. Slow cooking lets the fruit break down and water evaporate gradually, so the sauce thickens evenly. Stirring prevents the sugar and fruit from scorching on the bottom of the pot, which would leave a burnt taste.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, vinegar, cinnamon. 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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