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Dessert

Chartreuse of Grapes

A gelatin dessert of black and white grapes set in lemon jelly and whipped cream.

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 ↓

Chartreuse of Grapes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cream

  1. Dissolve 1 tablespoon of gelatine in enough water to cover it.

  2. Once cooled, mix the dissolved gelatine with the sweetened whipped cream.

Build the mold

  1. Pour about 2 inches of lemon jelly into a plain mold.

  2. When the jelly begins to set, line the mold with alternate layers of black and white grapes.

  3. Cover the grapes with more jelly and let it set.

  4. Dip a small bottle in cold water and place it in the center of the mold.

  5. Add a spoonful of jelly around the bottle and layer more grapes, adding jelly until the mold is full.

  6. When firm, pour hot water into the bottle to remove it from the jelly.

  7. Fill the space with the cream and dissolved gelatine mixture.

Turn out and serve

  1. Once firm, quickly turn out onto a cold dish and serve.

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. Grape + lemontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,412 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  4. Grape + sugartop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,490 recipes

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

  5. Grape + creamtop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,284 recipes

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

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Black grapes
Provide fruit flavour and a contrasting dark colour in the layers.
White grapes
Provide fruit flavour and a contrasting pale colour in the layers.
Gelatine
Sets the lemon jelly and the cream mixture so the mold holds its shape when turned out.
Whipped cream
Adds richness and a soft, light texture to the filling in the centre.

The step that matters

Turn out onto a cold dish. The mold must be firm before it is turned out. Gelatine sets as it cools, so if the jelly is not fully firm it can slump or tear. Quick handling on a cold dish keeps the shape.

Swap the grape

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Orangefits better
  3. Raspberryfits better
  4. Grapethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, sugar, lemon. 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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