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 currants
Gather ripe currants on a dry day and strip them from the stalks.
Bruise the currants in a large pan with a wooden pestle.
Let the bruised currants ferment for 24 hours.
Run the liquid through a hair sieve without touching it.
Add sugar and brandy
Add 2 ½ pounds of sugar for every gallon of liquid and stir well.
Pour the mixture into a vessel and add 1 quart of brandy.
Age and bottle
Let it stand for six weeks.
If clear, bottle it.
If not clear, draw it off into another vessel and let it sit for another fortnight 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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Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together11,939 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Currant + sugartop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together12,256 recipes
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
- Ripe currants
- Provide the fruit, juice and natural acids that form the wine's flavour.
- White sugar
- Feeds fermentation and adds sweetness to balance the fruit's tartness.
- Brandy
- Raises the alcohol content, stabilising the wine and preserving it during aging.
The step that matters
Running the liquid through the sieve without touching it. Pressing or squeezing the fruit forces solids and bitter compounds into the liquid, making the wine cloudy and harsher in flavour.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, brandy):
- Vanillafits better
- Apricotfits better
- Raisinfits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, 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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