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Gooseberry Wine

A fermented beverage made from gooseberries, sugar, water, isinglass, brandy, and egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Gooseberry Wine

Why it works: Brandy and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,340 recipes. Both carry acetoin, which smells butter, cream. The science ↓

Gooseberry Wine

Ingredients

Directions

Make the must

  1. Boil the water with the sugar for 15 minutes.

  2. Skim off any foam.

  3. Let it cool until almost cold.

  4. Bruise the gooseberries in a mortar.

  5. Add the bruised gooseberries to the cooled liquid.

  6. Let it stand for 2 days.

  7. Stir every 4 hours.

  8. Strain through a flannel bag into a cask.

Fine and add the finings

  1. Soak the isinglass in the brandy for 2 days.

  2. Beat the soaked isinglass with the egg whites for 30 minutes.

  3. Combine everything in the cask.

  4. Mix well.

Age

  1. Seal it.

  2. Let it stand for 6 months.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Brandy + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,340 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetoin (butter, cream).

  2. Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

Gooseberries
Provide the main fruit flavour, acidity and aroma for the wine.
Lump sugar
Feeds the yeast during fermentation and provides sweetness and alcohol in the finished wine.
Isinglass
Fining agent that helps clear the wine by settling out suspended particles.
Egg whites
Work with the isinglass to help clarify the wine as they settle out.
Brandy
Adds alcohol, which helps preserve the wine and carries aroma.

The step that matters

Strain through a flannel bag into a cask. Straining removes the fruit and pulp so that only clear liquid goes into the cask. Leftover solids can ferment unpredictably and cloud the wine, so the bag should be fine enough to catch them.

“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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