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Sauce

Currant Catsup

A sweet and spiced currant condiment made by simmering currants with sugar, spices, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Currant Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine currants, brown sugar, cinnamon, cloves, and cider or vinegar in a large pot.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil over medium heat.

  3. Reduce heat and simmer for 2 hours, 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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Currant + cidertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together500 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Clove + cidertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,683 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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 body and tartness that the sugar and spices balance.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and, as it cooks down, a deeper caramel-like flavour and thick body.
Cider or white wine vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and helps preserve the sauce.

The step that matters

Simmering with occasional stirring. Sugar-rich fruit scorches easily on the bottom of the pot, and the sauce thickens as water evaporates over the long simmer, so it needs stirring to keep it from burning and to cook evenly.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Applefits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Quincefits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cinnamon, clove, cider. 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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