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Dessert

Charlotte Russe

A chilled dessert made with whipped cream, gelatine, milk, sugar, and egg whites, layered over cake or ladyfingers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and sugar 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

Prepare

  1. Line a mold or dish with uniform-sized pieces of cake or ladyfingers.

  2. Whip the cream until stiff.

Make the custard

  1. Add sugar and beaten egg whites to the whipped cream, stirring lightly.

  2. Soak gelatine in half of the heated milk.

  3. Add the remaining milk to the gelatine and warm mixture.

  4. Pour the warm mixture into the cream while stirring lightly.

Assemble

  1. Pour the custard over the lined cake.

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. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Sweet cream
Whipped to stiff foam, it gives the charlotte its light, rich body.
Gelatine
Sets the mixture so it holds its shape when cut and served.
Egg whites
Beaten egg whites add airy structure that lightens the custard.
Cake or ladyfingers
Form the lining that gives the dessert its shape and soft structure.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the rich cream and milk.

The step that matters

Stirring the warm gelatine mixture into the cream. Gelatine must be warm enough to stay liquid and mix evenly, but stirring too hard deflates the whipped cream and egg whites, weakening the airy structure the dessert depends on. Stir gently and fold in.

“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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