Why it works: Red currant and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 26% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,156 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Currant Jam
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Gather currants on a dry day, ensuring they are free from dust.
Place currants and powdered sugar in a preserving pan.
Cook
Stir gently over a brisk fire and bring to a boil.
Boil for exactly 8 minutes from the first full boil.
If the jam rises over the pan, lift it from the fire briefly.
For a sweeter jam, use equal weights of fruit and sugar and boil for 7 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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Red currant + sugartop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,156 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Red currants
- Provides the fruit, natural pectin and tartness that give the jam its body and flavor.
- Powdered sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the jam set and keep well.
The step that matters
Timing the boil. The boil must be timed from the first full boil. Boiling too briefly leaves the jam runny because pectin has not set, while boiling too long makes it stiff, dark and dull in flavor.
“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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