Why it works: Currant and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,057 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓
Currant Wine
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the syrup
Boil 2 cups of sugar and 4 cups of water for 30 minutes.
Whisk in 2 egg whites until fine.
Let the mixture cool.
Add 1 tablespoon of fresh barm.
Let it sit for 7-8 days.
Stir daily.
Ferment in the barrel
Chop the currants.
Place them in a barrel.
Pour the cooled mixture over them.
Dissolve 1 tablespoon of isinglass in a little wine.
Add it to the barrel.
Stir daily for 6-8 weeks.
Close the barrel.
Let it age for about 9 months before bottling.
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.
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Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,057 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
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Egg + brandytop 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).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Currant + eggtop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together8,734 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
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
- Smyrna currants
- Provide the fruit flavour and the sugars that the barm ferments into alcohol.
- Sugar
- Feeds the yeast during fermentation and sets the final sweetness and alcohol level.
- Whites of eggs
- Whisked in to collect fine particles, helping the liquid clear as it settles.
- Fresh barm
- Yeast that starts the fermentation, turning sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide.
- Isinglass
- A fining agent that draws suspended particles down, helping the wine clear.
The step that matters
Adding the barm to the cooled mixture. Yeast is killed by heat, so the syrup must be fully cooled before the barm goes in. Adding it while hot can stop fermentation before it starts.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg, brandy):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Apricotfits about as well
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, brandy. 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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