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Currant Jelly, Red

A clear jelly made from moderately ripe currants and sugar.

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

Currant Jelly, Red

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the juice

  1. Remove the stalks from the currants.

  2. Place the currants in a jar.

  3. Simmer the currants in a saucepan of boiling water for about 30 minutes until the juice flows freely.

  4. Strain the juice through flannel without pressing the fruit to keep the jelly clear.

Make the jelly

  1. In a preserving pan, combine the juice and sugar.

  2. Heat the mixture until the sugar melts.

  3. Bring the mixture to a boil and simmer for about 30 minutes, stirring well.

  4. Test the jelly by placing a small amount on a cold plate; if it jellies, it is done.

Jar

  1. Pour the jelly into jars.

  2. Cover the jars once cool.

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 natural pectin and acid that let the juice set into a jelly.
Loaf sugar
Sweetens the juice and helps the jelly set and keep its texture.

The step that matters

Do not press the fruit when straining. Pressing forces cloudy particles and fine pulp through the flannel, which makes the finished jelly cloudy instead of clear.

“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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