Consuming Passions: Blackcurrants
In the latest instalment of our Consuming Passions series, Elly McCausland, author of The Botanical Kitchen, recalls the childhood origin of her passion for blackcurrants. This small, intensely colored and flavored summer fruit is familiar in Europe, where its short season runs from July until mid-August, but it remains something of a rarity in the United States — in fact Wikipedia claims that just 0.1% of Americans have ever tasted one. Perhaps that is about to change…
The blackcurrant is a peculiar fruit, in that it manages to be both very childish and yet very grown-up at the same time. British children are most likely to encounter this plump little currant in the form of the soft drink Ribena, which proudly advertised in a campaign several years back that ninety-five percent of Britain’s blackcurrants end up pulped and sugared within its cartons. In our tender years, we are perhaps more likely to know the blackcurrant simply by its colour, where it constitutes ‘the purple one’ in a packet of wine gums or fruit pastilles. It is the taste of tooth-achingly sweet cough syrup; of birthday party squash. If you are Norwegian, it is the flavour of childhood cross-country ski trips, whose intense physical activity demands calorific sustenance in the form of a waffle or chocolate bar and a thermos of sweetened hot blackcurrant juice.
These syrupy pretenders bear no resemblance to the complex, challenging, decidedly adult qualities of the fruit itself, qualities which perhaps explain why so much of the glorious currant crop ends up squandered in a one-dimensional drink whose only relation to the beautiful fruit lies in its name – Ribena, derived from the currant’s botanical moniker, Ribes nigrum. The blackcurrant is a tricky one, from the moment you decide to harvest it. Unlike its more manageable cousins, red- and whitecurrants, blackcurrants do not hang in convenient long strands from their parent plant, to be plucked like grapes from the vine. They dangle singly or in pairs from the twig, demanding much more of your time and effort. They come away with fiddly little stalks attached, unlike redcurrants, which can simply be stripped from their long central stem with the tines of a fork. Perhaps for these reasons, blackcurrants remain very much a seasonal fruit, only available for a two-month summer window, and often found outside the mainstream supermarkets. Bags of frozen blackcurrants are well worth looking out for, though.
Black Currant Pie from Pie for Everyone by Petra Paradez.
Once you’ve managed to acquire them, whether by picking or purchasing, the blackcurrant makes still further demands upon your time and effort. Unlike their red siblings, these are less easy to pop into a fruit salad or drop daintily atop a dessert. Where whitecurrants, almost equally sour, possess a pearly beauty that enables us to overlook their mouth-puckering tartness, blackcurrants are less likely to end up as a garnish, owing to their rather less photogenic inky matt skins. They possess a sourness and an astringency that is usually tempered through the addition of heat and sugar, but even then, their assertive flavour can sometimes require a little extra creativity in the kitchen.
Perfect blackcurrant partnerships
Persevere, though, and you will be rewarded many times over. The blackcurrant has a gloriously complex, herbaceous bouquet of flavours that lies somewhere between freshly cut grass and lavender; or, in the words of the food writer Niki Segnit, ‘a “catty” quality in common with Sauvignon Blanc, gooseberries and green tea’. Performing at its best when cooked, it lends itself to a diverse array of uses, from incorporating into fluffy cake batters to simmering into a versatile compote that can be swirled through cream, ice cream, or yoghurt, whipped into a violet mousse, or used as the basis for a rich tart, jam, sorbet, or – if you like your flavours drinkable and really miss your Ribena, perhaps an infused vinegar or a homemade cassis. There are even certain blackcurrant varieties sweet enough to eat raw: enjoy delightful pops of sweet-sour purple in salads (particularly good with smoked fish, hard cheeses and nutty grains like spelt or freekeh) or use to garnish rich chocolate desserts.
Blackcurrant vinegar. Photo credit: Elly McCausland
Their sourness and complexity of flavour makes blackcurrants perfect partners for both sweet and savoury flavours, and they are particularly good at cutting through richness like a bold, purple knife. They pair well with game such as pigeon and venison, their deep colour accenting the dark flesh of the meat itself, but are also good with fattier meats like pork. They work wonderfully with cheese: try baking a whole camembert stuffed with blackcurrants, pecans and herbs and then drizzling it with honey, before scooping it up with slices of toasted baguette. Blackcurrants also have great affinity with dark chocolate, complementing the bitterness of cacao with their herbal bite, and balance out the flavours – and colours - of other berries in a classic summer pudding or a redcurrant and blackcurrant cream tart. They are a pleasingly aromatic foil to other more neutral fruits, too, like the comforting blandness of apple in this apple and blackcurrant crumble tart, or the uniform sweetness of juicy peaches in this blackcurrant and peach pie. Anywhere you find sweet dairy, a blackcurrant will provide a welcome partner, as in this blackcurrant fool with little cinnamon biscuits or baked egg custard tart.
Summer pudding from The Cook’s Book of Everything by Lulu Grimes
Don’t leave the leaves
If you are lucky enough to have access to a blackcurrant bush or two, don’t neglect the leaves: they have the glorious herbaceous tang of the fruit about them, which is particularly pronounced when crushed in your palm after the sun has warmed them on a summer afternoon. Roughly torn and infused in a pan of warm milk and cream, they make a wonderful ice cream. They can also be simmered with sugar and water into an exquisitely unusual syrup that demands to be drizzled over a lemon-scented sponge cake, used in cocktails, or even, as in Keith Floyd’s recipe, used to make a distinctive sorbet.
Save your stash: blackcurrant preservation
Both blackcurrant leaves and the fruit itself freeze well. For the former, wipe with a damp tea towel to remove any dirt or bugs, then place flat in a bag in the freezer. For the latter, rinse the currants well in water and remove any stalks. Lay on a tea towel in a single layer to dry completely, then freeze in boxes or bags. You can also simmer the currants with a little sugar and water to make a thick, rich compote, and freeze this for later use.
In a world where so many ingredients are available year-round, with questionable environmental consequences, the limited seasonality of the blackcurrant ( is perhaps something to be cherished, compounding the allure of this underrated berry. Snap them up while you can, and enjoy the unique touch they are sure to bring to your cooking.