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Dessert

Charlotte Russe

A chilled dessert made with lady fingers, canned peaches, cherries, sugar, whipped cream, nuts, jelly, wine, and gelatine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Charlotte Russe

Ingredients

Directions

Assemble

  1. Line a bowl with lady fingers and canned peaches and cherries.

  2. Mix sugar, whipped cream, nuts, jelly, wine, and gelatine.

  3. Pour the mixture over the lady fingers.

Set and serve

  1. Place in a cool place to set.

  2. Serve with whipped cream and canned cherries on top.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Wine + peachtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together218 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  3. Sugar + peachtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,308 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Cream + nutstop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together886 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  5. Cream + winetop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,887 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Gelatine
Sets the liquid mixture so it holds its shape when chilled.
Whipped cream
Adds richness and a light, airy texture to the filling.
Lady fingers
Act as the sponge-like base that soaks up moisture and gives structure to the dessert.
Jelly
Adds sweetness, fruit flavour and body to the filling.
Wine
Adds acidity and aroma to the filling.

The step that matters

Place in a cool place to set. Gelatine needs to chill long enough to firm up fully; if the mixture stays warm or is disturbed too early, the charlotte will not hold its shape when turned out or sliced.

Swap the nuts

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cream, wine, peach):

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Chestnutfits better
  3. Pistachiofits better
  4. Nutsthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream, wine, peach. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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