Cassell's dictionary of cookery

"T! Currant Wine, Black. — Take six quarts of black currant jun-c ; mix it with six quarts of cold water and twelve pounds of moist sugar. Wlien the sugar is dissolved put the liquor into a cask, which must be kept in a warm, dry room. It win ferment without anything else being added to it. A little of the liquid should be kept with which to fill up the cask when the fermentation is over, and the wine has been well skimmed. Before closing the cask add one quart of brandy. Currant wine should not be bottkd for twelve months, and will fee im- proved if kept even longer. This wine will be good for several years. Probable cost of cur- rants, 4d. to 6d. per quart. i^Ciirrant Wine, Red. — Take three gal- lons of ripe red cui-rants, jjick from the stalks, bruise them and press out the juice, and infuse the residue in four and a half gallons of cold water. Mix well and repeatedly to insure equal diffusion ; press out the liquor, mix it with the juice, and add fourteen pounds of loaf sugar. When the sugar is dissolved, transfer the whole to a cask large enough to leave some space unfilled, put in the bung and bore a hole through it with the gimlet, and allow the cask to stand where the temperature is not less than seventy degrees, for a month. By that time the fermentation will have greatly de- creiised. Add three pounds of sugar, dissolved in two quarts of warai water, shake the cask well, and bung it as before. In about six or eight weeks, on listening at the bunghole, your ear will inform you that fermentation has ceased, then rack off the clear liquor from the sediment, and mix with it a quart of the best French brandy. Set it by in the cellar for about two months, when the liquor is again to be racked off into a clean but not new cask, which should be quite filled ; it must now be tightly bunged down, so as to exclude the air perfectly, and be preserved for three or four years at a temperature of seventy degrees. AVIien neces- sary the cask should be for this purpose kept near a fire. Time, about three months to cement. Currant Wine, WTiite. — "Wliite currant wine may be made in the same way as red, with two ounces of bruised bitter abnonds mixed in the fermenting liquor. Currant Wine from Unripe Fruit. —Currants may be Tised for making wine before they are quite lipe. They should be bruised sufficiently to burst the berries, and have the water poured over them : the sugar may be intro- duced at once. If this is done the wine will be strong and highly flavoured, though not very sweet. The wine must be well strained before it is put into the cask. The same proportions may be allowed for this wine as for black cur- rant, and the same directions may be followed. The only difference wiU be that greater care ynll be required in separating the stalks from the fruit. Currants, Compote of.— Pick a quart of ripe red and white currants quite free from dust. Put half a pound of loaf sugar and a breakfast- cupful of cold water into a saucepan. Simmer the syrup gently for a quarter of an hour, then put in the currants, and simmer them for ten minutes longer. Put the fruit into a compote dish, pour the syrup over it, and serve cold. Currants prepared thus are excellent served with blancmange or a rice mould. Probable cast of currants, 4d. to 6d. jjer quart. Sufficient for a good-.sized dish.