Skip to main content
Dessert

Black Cubbant Jam

A jam made from ripe currants and sugar, boiled and preserved in jars.

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

Why it works: Currant and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 26% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,256 recipes. The science ↓

Black Cubbant Jam

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Pick the currants from the stalks and bruise them in a bowl with a potato masher.

  2. In a preserving kettle, stir the bruised fruit and sugar together.

Cook the jam

  1. Boil the mixture for 45 minutes, stirring and skimming constantly to prevent sticking.

  2. Once done, pour the jam into small glasses.

Seal

  1. When cold, cover with brandy paper and tie securely or paste paper over the edges.

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. Currant + sugartop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,256 recipes

Currant and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,256 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 fruit flavour, natural pectin and acidity that give the jam its body and tang.
Loaf sugar
Sweetens the jam and, as it dissolves and concentrates, helps it set and preserves it.

The step that matters

Boiling and stirring the mixture. Sugar and fruit can scorch on the bottom of the kettle if not stirred and skimmed constantly. Scorching gives a burnt taste, and the jam can stick and thicken unevenly as sugar concentrates and pectin sets during the boil.

“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