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 Wine
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the juice
Gather currants on a dry day when ripe.
Strip currants into a large pan and bruise them with a wooden pestle.
Let the bruised currants stand for 24 hours to ferment.
Sweeten and fortify
Rub the mixture through a fine sieve without touching the liquor.
Stir in 2.5 pounds of white sugar for every gallon of liquor.
Transfer the mixture into a vessel and add 1 quart of brandy for every 6 gallons.
Rest and bottle
Let it stand for 6 weeks.
If clear, bottle it; if not, draw off the clear liquid into another vessel and bottle it after 2 weeks.
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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Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,057 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
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Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together11,939 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Currant + sugartop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked 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
- Provide the fruit flavour and the sugars that ferment into alcohol.
- White sugar
- Feeds fermentation and sweetens the finished wine.
- Brandy
- Adds alcohol that helps keep the wine stable after fermentation.
The step that matters
Let the bruised currants stand 24 hours to ferment. Wild yeasts on the fruit convert the juice's sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide. This early fermentation must happen before straining, since it sets up the alcohol and flavour that the later steps build on.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, brandy):
- Vanillafits better
- Apricotfits better
- Raisinfits better
- 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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