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 ↓
Currant Jelly
Ingredients
Directions
Extract the juice
Tie currants in a jar and place in a kettle with water.
Boil over low heat for 2 hours.
Strain the juice through a fine sieve without squeezing the currants.
Make the jelly
Add ¾ pound of sugar to every pint of juice.
Heat over very low heat until sugar dissolves without stirring.
Once scum rises, remove it and boil quickly for 20 minutes.
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 and white currants
- Provide the natural pectin and acidity that allow the juice to set into a jelly.
- Loaf sugar
- Sweetens the jelly and, with pectin and acid, helps it set firm.
The step that matters
Dissolve the sugar over very low heat without stirring. Gentle heat lets the sugar dissolve slowly without scorching or forming crystals. Stirring can introduce crystals that cause a grainy set, and fast heat can burn the sugar before it dissolves.
“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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