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Drink

Currant Champagne

A fermented beverage made from currants, sugar, brandy, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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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 Champagne

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Gather currants in dry weather when ripe.

  2. Mash the currants gently to break the berries without bruising the stems.

  3. Add a portion of the water and stir well.

  4. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve.

  5. Press the strained mixture gently with your hands.

Ferment

  1. Combine the sugar and brandy in a tub.

  2. Pour the strained liquid over the sugar and brandy.

  3. Stir until the sugar is dissolved.

  4. Strain the mixture through a fine cloth into a 32-gallon cask.

  5. Fill the cask to within 2 gallons of the top to allow for fermentation.

  6. Seal the cask tightly.

  7. Complete the process quickly.

Bottle

  1. Bottle the wine as soon as it is clear for best results.

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. Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

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

  3. Currant + sugartop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked 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

Currants
Supply the juice, fruit flavor and acidity that form the base of the wine.
Refined sugar
Provides sweetness and the sugar that yeast converts into alcohol during fermentation.
White brandy
Adds alcohol, strengthening the wine and contributing to its preservation.

The step that matters

Fill the cask to within 2 gallons of the top. Fermentation produces gas and foam, so the empty space at the top leaves room for the liquid to expand and rise without overflowing or forcing the seal.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. 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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