Why it works: White currant and sugar work together. They rank in the top 29% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 59 recipes. The science ↓
Jelly of Ripe Gooseberries
Ingredients
Directions
Extract the juice
Place the gooseberries in a pot over low heat and stir gently until they release all their juice.
Pour off the juice without pressing the fruit and strain it through a fine sieve and then a double muslin strainer.
Weigh the juice and for every 3 pounds of gooseberry juice, add 1 pound of prepared white currant juice.
Make the jelly
Boil the mixture quickly for 15 minutes.
Remove from heat and stir in half the weight of the juice in sugar until dissolved.
Boil the jelly for an additional 6 minutes, skim thoroughly, and pour into jars or molds.
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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White currant + sugartop 29% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together59 recipes
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Red gooseberries
- Provide the main fruit juice and tartness that gives the jelly its flavour and body.
- White currant juice
- Adds natural pectin and acidity to help the jelly set.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the jelly and, with boiling, helps it thicken and set.
The step that matters
Boiling the jelly after adding sugar. Sugar must dissolve fully before the final boil. Boiling the jelly long enough lets it reach the concentration needed to set, while overboiling can darken the flavour and make the set too firm.
“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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