How to Make Red Currant Jelly in Canada (Bernardin Method)

Red currant jelly is a jewel-clear, tart-sweet July classic, as good on toast as it is melted into a pan sauce for game or lamb. It is made in two stages: extract the juice, then turn the juice into jelly.

This guide follows the Bernardin Complete Book of Home Preserving (ISBN 978-0-7788-0137-5) — the juice from page 104, the jelly from the Red Currant variation on page 112, which follows the Berry Jelly method and processing time on page 111. Adjust the processing time for your altitude with the altitude-adjustments guide.

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What the book publishes for red currants

The Bernardin Complete Book of Home Preserving publishes one red currant jelly, and it is a liquid-pectin recipe: the Red Currant variation on page 112, which borrows the method and the processing time from Berry Jelly on page 111.

It publishes no traditional, no-added-pectin red currant jelly. The Traditional Jellies section on page 116 runs crabapple, apple and grape, and stops there. So the no-pectin method this page used to carry had nothing behind it — not a wrong figure so much as a recipe with no source at all, and that is why it has been replaced rather than corrected.

Red currants do carry a lot of natural pectin and acid. We are not putting a number on either, because nothing we hold publishes one, and the recipe below does not depend on it.

What you need

From the Bernardin Complete Book of Home Preserving (ISBN 978-0-7788-0137-5), pages 104 and 112. Makes about eight 250 mL jars.

• Red currants, caps and stems removed — the book’s juice page gives 1 lb (500 g) per cup (250 mL) of juice, and this recipe needs 5 cups, so plan on five times that
• Water for the juice — just enough to stop the fruit scorching, about ¼ to ½ cup (50 to 125 mL) per 4 cups (1 L) of berries
• 5 cups (1.25 L) red currant juice — the quantity the jelly starts from
• 7 cups (1.75 L) granulated sugar
• 3 oz (88.5 mL) liquid pectin
• A jelly bag, or several layers of cheesecloth in a colander — dampened
• Bernardin 250 mL regular-mouth jars, fresh SNAP lids, bands
• Standard canning kit — jar lifter, headspace tool, funnel, water-bath canner, ladle (which canner to buy)

No lemon juice. Several of the page 112 jelly variations take bottled lemon juice; the Red Currant one does not. Use the acid quantity in the recipe in front of you and never carry one across from a neighbouring variation.

The figures on this page come from the edition we hold — ISBN 978-0-7788-0137-5, 448 pages. Different editions of the Complete Book carry different figures, so verify the process time against your own edition before you start.

Corrected 17 September 2026: this page previously published a no-added-pectin red currant jelly of our own — currants simmered with their stems on, a sugar-to-juice ratio of roughly one to one, and a finishing temperature. No source we hold publishes any of those figures, and the Complete Book publishes no traditional red currant jelly at all. The recipe above is the Red Currant variation on page 112, which uses liquid pectin. Two variations and our own yield estimate have also been removed.

Stage 1: the juice (page 104)

1. Remove the caps and stems from the currants. The book asks for this before the fruit is cooked.
2. Combine the fruit with just enough water to prevent scorching — about ¼ to ½ cup (50 to 125 mL) per 4 cups (1 L) of berries — in a large stainless steel saucepan.
3. Bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce the heat, cover loosely and boil gently 5 to 10 minutes, crushing the fruit occasionally.
4. Drip it. Pour into a damp jelly bag or a cheesecloth-lined sieve set over a bowl and let it drip at least 2 hours or overnight. Do not squeeze the bag — page 105 says squeezing may make the juice cloudy.
5. Measure 5 cups (1.25 L) of juice. That volume is where the jelly recipe starts, so measure it rather than estimating.

Stage 2: the jelly (pages 111 and 112)

1. Combine the juice and 7 cups (1.75 L) sugar in a large stainless steel saucepan.
2. Bring to a full rolling boil over high heat — one that cannot be stirred down.
3. Stir in 3 oz (88.5 mL) liquid pectin, squeezing the pouch to get all of it out.
4. Boil hard 1 minute, stirring constantly.
5. Remove from the heat and skim off any foam with a large slotted metal spoon.
6. Ladle into hot 250 mL jars leaving 0.5 cm (¼ inch) headspace. Don’t run a bubble remover — the book notes jellies are pure liquids, so removing air bubbles is not required.
7. Wipe rims, apply fresh SNAP lids fingertip-tight, and lower the jars into the canner so they are covered by at least 2.5 cm (1 inch) of water.
8. Process 10 minutes at altitudes up to 305 m, adjusted for your altitude band.
9. Turn off the heat, remove the canner lid and wait 5 minutes before lifting the jars out.
10. Cool 24 hours undisturbed; confirm each lid sealed.

There is no gel-stage test on this recipe. The book’s introduction to its liquid-pectin jellies says these need the least cooking of all cooked jellies and that there is no need to worry about a gel stage test. The 1-minute hard boil after the pectin is what sets them.

Uses beyond toast

• Glaze for tarts and cheesecakes.
• Pan sauce for lamb, venison, or duck — a spoonful melted into the deglaze.
• Cumberland sauce base, with port and orange.

Variations

None. This page’s two — a red currant and raspberry blend, and a sprig of mint dropped into the cook — both changed the composition of a tested recipe, and neither came from a source. They are removed rather than rewritten.

Page 112 does publish its own neighbours, each with its own juice quantity, sugar quantity and pectin volume: Black Raspberry, Strawberry, Cherry and Concord Grape. Those are separate recipes, not adjustments to this one, so follow whichever you want in full rather than mixing juices inside this one.

Next steps

• How to make black currant jam — the bolder, darker cousin
• How to make gooseberry jam — the other tart July Ribes berry
• How to make apple jelly — the book publishes both a liquid-pectin and a no-added-pectin route for apple
• Canadian altitude adjustments — for your processing time
• Water-bath canning pillar — the full method