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Dessert

Black Currant Lozenges

A sweet, stiff candy made from boiled black currants, sugar, cream of tartar, and gum arabic.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Black Currant Lozenges

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the juice

  1. Boil or bake the black currants in a jar until the juice separates.

  2. Press the juice from the fruit or measure the fruit into a preserving pan.

  3. Boil the fruit or juice for about 30 minutes before adding sugar.

Make the lozenges

  1. Add ½ pound of sugar, 1 ounce of cream of tartar, and 1 ounce of gum arabic mixed with a small amount of boiling juice.

  2. Boil the mixture until it is very stiff and candies on the sides of the pan.

  3. Pour the mixture onto flat dishes or upside-down plates, keeping the thickness to ⅛ inch.

  4. Dry the lozenges in the sun or near a fire, turning them carefully when one side hardens.

  5. Once dry, cut them into lozenges using a sharp tin cutter.

  6. Shake a little magnesia among the lozenges to prevent sticking.

Store

  1. Store in writing paper or tin boxes in a very dry place.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Black currant + creamtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together67 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Black currant + sugartop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together393 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Black currants
Provide the flavour, colour and the pectin-rich juice that forms the base of the lozenges.
Fine loaf sugar
Adds sweetness and, once boiled stiff, helps the mixture set into a firm, chewy lozenge.
Cream of tartar
Adds acidity that keeps the sugar from crystallising, giving a smoother, less grainy texture.
Gum arabic
Acts as a binder and thickener that gives the lozenges body and helps them hold their shape.

The step that matters

Boiling the mixture to a very stiff stage. Boiling until the mixture is very stiff and candies on the pan sides concentrates the sugar so it sets firm when dried. Under-boiling leaves lozenges soft and sticky, while over-boiling makes them brittle.

Swap the black currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cream):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Raspberryfits better
  4. Black currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream. 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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