Discover Delicious Currants & Gooseberries

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When you first bite into a gooseberry, the tartness of the skin is balanced by the burst of sweet nectar from the flesh of the fruit. Keep eating and your mouth picks up the fragrance of the fruit — similar to the flavors found in good-tasting grapes, plums or apricots. Red, white and pink currants, gooseberry’s close relatives, have a sprightly and refreshing flavor, too, with just a bit of sweetness. Another relative, the European black currant, offers a musky sweet-tartness.

Despite being delicious and easy to grow, gooseberries and currants — in the genus Ribes (RYE-bees) — have had their ups and downs here in the United States. A hundred years ago, they were rising stars along with blueberries as commercial and backyard fruits, but the popularity of currants and gooseberries was cut short when they were implicated in the spread of rust disease in white pines, an important timber crop at the time. A federal law in the 1920s banned their planting, and in the decades that followed, wild and cultivated plants were ripped out of forests and gardens. Because cultivated varieties of gooseberries and red currants are relatively immune to rust disease and because the disease could spread hundreds of miles from susceptible wild Ribes, the ban was not very effective. It was lifted in the 1960s, and the concern was put under state mandate. By then, however, two generations of Americans had forgotten about these tasty berries.

Thanks in large part to Steven McKay, who founded the International Ribes Association when he was teaching agriculture in California 15 years ago, gooseberries and currants are experiencing a renaissance. Nurseries now offer a number of high-quality varieties, so the bushes are increasingly turning up in backyard gardens and on small farms. European black currants, which are extremely rich in vitamin C and antioxidants, also are susceptible to the rust disease, but rust-resistant varieties are being introduced, too. Greg Quinn of New York-based Au Currant Enterprises says he hopes to see 5,000 acres of currants planted in the next decade in the United States.

Over the years, I’ve grown about 50 or so varieties of gooseberries, all of them so-called “dessert” varieties that are delicious both fresh and when cooked into jams and pies. My favorites for flavor include ‘Webster,’ ‘Achilles,’ ‘Hinnonmaki Yellow,’ ‘Jumbo’ and ‘Captivator.’

I also grow a half-dozen varieties each of red currants — ‘Pink Champagne’ is my “currant” favorite — and black currants — ‘Kirovchanka’ (soon to be available from Raintree Nursery or the author — Mother) is my favorite because it’s sweeter than most other varieties but still retains a very rich currant flavor. I sprinkle fresh currants on cereal, cook them into a sauce to pour over ice cream, or freeze them so that I can keep eating them year-round. Many people prefer currants cooked or in pies and jams.

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