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Dessert

Charlottes

A chilled gelatin dessert made with milk, eggs, sherry, cream, lemon-flavored sugar, and layered with savoy cakes or sponge cakes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Charlottes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard base

  1. Soak the gelatine in a little water until soft.

  2. Combine the gelatine and milk in a saucepan.

  3. Heat until the gelatine dissolves.

  4. Remove from heat.

  5. Stir in the beaten egg yolks.

  6. Cook until thickened.

  7. Let the mixture cool.

Assemble and chill

  1. Mix in the sherry, thick cream, and lemon-flavored sugar.

  2. Whip the mixture until very thick.

  3. Rinse a mould with cold water.

  4. Layer savoy cakes at the bottom. Arrange some upright around the sides.

  5. Pour in the whipped cream mixture.

  6. Chill for 1-2 hours.

  7. Turn the Charlotte out onto an ornamental dish.

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. Milk + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,479 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).

  3. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  4. Sherry + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,273 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

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 the Charlotte holds its shape when turned out.
Egg yolks
Thicken the milk mixture into a rich custard when cooked.
Thick cream
Adds richness and, once whipped, a light, airy body.
Savoy cakes
Form the sponge structure that holds the set filling in shape.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard.

The step that matters

Cook until thickened. Egg yolks scramble if overheated, so the custard must be cooked gently and stirred to thicken smoothly before it is cooled and combined with the cream.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, egg, sherry, cream, sugar):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, egg, sherry, cream, sugar. 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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Russe 408Apple 235Orange 67Strawberry 34Peach 23Polonaise 17 See all 25 →

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