The cassissine:Dijon's blackcurrant confection

In short: the cassissine is a blackcurrant fruit paste filled with a liqueur-soaked heart of crème de cassis, born in Dijon in 1901. It condenses two pillars of Burgundy’s terroir into a single candy: blackcurrant grown in Côte-d’Or and Dijon’s confectionery know-how.

Under its lightly sweet, purple coating, the cassissine hides a liquid heart that runs on the first bite. Unlike an ordinary fruit paste, which is entirely solid, it pairs a gelled blackcurrant-paste shell with a liqueur-soaked centre made from crème de cassis, Dijon’s emblematic liqueur.

A recipe born in Dijon in the early 20th century

The original cassissine recipe dates from 1901. A Dijon confectioner developed a blackcurrant fruit paste filled with a liqueur heart, under a different name than the one it carries today. In 1920, another confectionery workshop in the city gave the sweet its current name, “cassissine,” which has stood since as the generic term for it. The principle hasn’t changed in over a century: a shell of sieved blackcurrant fruit paste, worked to a fine texture, encloses a liquid heart that stays runny thanks to its high sugar and alcohol content.

The cassissine belongs to a wider Dijon confectionery tradition, documented alongside other local specialities such as gingerbread or mustard: turning a regional raw material into a treat recognisable at a glance.

Blackcurrant, a red fruit turned Burgundy emblem

A long-standing crop, a structured trade

Blackcurrant has grown in Burgundy since the 16th century, first planted along vine rows for its supposed medicinal properties. By 1873, Côte-d’Or already counted more than 300 hectares of blackcurrant bushes. Today, the regional trade brings together around a hundred growers for an average harvest of roughly 1,500 tonnes of berries a year.

The Noir de Bourgogne variety dominates production by far, accounting for close to 70% of the area planted in Bourgogne-Franche-Comté. It’s required under the specifications of the “Cassis de Dijon” and “Cassis de Bourgogne” protected geographical indications, alongside a second local variety, “Royal de Naples.” Only berries harvested within a defined set of communes in Côte-d’Or and Saône-et-Loire can claim these designations.

From berry to liqueur

The best-known use of Burgundy blackcurrant remains crème de cassis, developed in Dijon in 1841, which industrialised a previously artisanal process of macerating berries in sweetened alcohol. EU rules require this liqueur to contain a minimum of 400 grams of sugar per litre at at least 15 degrees of alcohol; Burgundy crèmes de cassis in practice run more like 16 to 20 degrees. Every year, the region’s liqueur makers produce more than 16 million bottles of crème de cassis, much of it used to make kir, Dijon’s signature aperitif.

That same crème de cassis is what fills the cassissine’s liqueur heart: the candy is, in a sense, the solid, portable version of the Burgundy liqueur.

The manufacturing process, between fruit paste and filled candy

The shell: a classic fruit paste

The cassissine’s shell follows the general fruit-paste process. Blackcurrant berries are puréed, sieved to remove the seeds, then cooked hot with sugar, glucose syrup and pectin. The glucose syrup limits crystallisation, while pectin sets the paste’s gel. Cooking continues to around 79° on the Brix scale, which measures the mixture’s sugar concentration: past that point the paste hardens too much to work; below it, it stays too soft to hold its shape.

The heart: the step that sets the cassissine apart

Adding the liquid heart is what distinguishes a cassissine from an ordinary fruit paste. A small amount of crème de cassis, sometimes thickened, is poured into the centre of the still-warm paste before the shell closes and cools.

A precise dose

This step has to be exact: too much liquid and the shell splits; too little and the candy loses the runny-heart effect it’s known for. Once cooled, each candy is rolled in crystallised sugar, as is customary for fruit pastes in general.

Tasting and pairing the cassissine

The cassissine is eaten as it is, at the end of a meal or alongside coffee. Its kinship with the kir also makes it a nod to Dijon’s signature aperitif: some serve it at the end of a crème de cassis tasting, to carry the same dark-fruit aromas on the palate.