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Currant Wine from Unripe Fruit
Currants may be used for making wine before they are quite ripe. They should be bruised sufficiently to burst the berries, and have the water poured over them: the sugar may be introduced at once. If this is done the wine, which must be well strained before it is put into the cask, will be strong and highly flavoured, though not very sweet. The same proportions may be allowed for this wine as for black currant, and the same directions may be followed. The only difference is that greater care will be required in separating the stalks from the fruit.
This is a variation note rather than a standalone recipe: it assumes you already have the book's black currant wine to hand for quantities and method. Read it as guidance on what changes when the fruit is picked early.
- No quantities hereThe text explicitly defers to the black currant wine entry for proportions, so nothing on this page tells you how much water or sugar to use. Figures in the region of 3-4 lb of fruit and 3 lb of sugar to the gallon of water turn up in period country-wine recipes, but they vary a good deal from book to book: treat that as background rather than a conversion of this recipe.
- Why unripe fruit behaves differentlyGreen currants are higher in acid and pectin and much lower in sugar, so expect a sharp, austere wine that needs long ageing. Consider a pectic enzyme at the start to avoid a permanent haze. (The original attributes the "strong and highly flavoured, though not very sweet" result to adding the sugar at once -- see below.)
- The stalks are the hingeThe warning about separating stalks is the practical heart of the note. Green stems and unripe fruit both carry a lot of tannin, and stalks left in a long ferment give a hard, drying bitterness that time will not fully soften.
- "Bruised sufficiently to burst the berries"Crush, do not pulverise. The aim is to open every berry so the water and sugar can draw out juice; breaking seeds and stems adds harshness.
- Sugar at once, and what it costsAdding all the sugar before fermentation, rather than feeding it in, gives a high starting gravity and a fast, warm ferment. This is what the original means by strong: more alcohol, less residual sweetness.
- YeastThis page says nothing about yeast; check the black currant entry it refers you to, since period recipes sometimes specify one and sometimes leave the ferment to wild yeast from fruit and air. A packet of wine yeast gives a more predictable ferment.
- The caskA modern equivalent is a glass demijohn or food-grade fermenter with an airlock, filled nearly to the neck so there is minimal headspace. Strain thoroughly first, as the text says; solids left in bulk storage will throw off flavours.
- Never seal a fermenting vesselCarbon dioxide production is vigorous in the first week. Use an airlock or a loose cover, and do not cork bottles until fermentation has genuinely finished.
- TimingReckon on a week or two of active ferment, several months in bulk, and at least a year in bottle before an unripe-currant wine stops tasting raw.
Currant wine was a staple of the English domestic cellar, made from the red, white and black currants common in kitchen gardens, which ripen faster than a household can eat them. Underripe fruit was worth using because the thinnings and early pickings, too sour to eat, still had acid, tannin and enough juice to ferment. The book's assumption that the reader has a cask, a strainer and a supply of sugar reflects a period when country wines and cordials were ordinary domestic production rather than a hobby. The dry, hard, long-keeping wine described here is characteristic of the type, and such wines were usually given a year or more before drinking.