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Dessert

Gooseberry Charlotte

A chilled dessert of gooseberries in gelatin, cream, and wine jelly, set in a molded biscuit base.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Angelica and biscuit share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 69 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Gooseberry Charlotte

Ingredients

Directions

Decorate and line the mold

  1. Decorate a plain mold with fruits.

  2. Set the decorated mold in jelly.

  3. Line the sides of the mold with biscuits.

Make the gooseberry cream

  1. Trim the gooseberries.

  2. Cook the trimmed gooseberries with water until soft.

  3. Sweeten the gooseberries well.

  4. Soak the gelatine in water.

  5. Pour off the excess water from the gelatine.

  6. Add the gelatine to the fruit. Stir until dissolved.

  7. Rub the mixture through a sieve.

  8. Let the mixture cool.

  9. Whisk the cream until stiff.

  10. Add the cooled fruit mixture to the cream.

  11. Color the mixture a pale green.

Set and serve

  1. When the mixture begins to set, pour it into the prepared mold.

  2. Once firm, dip the mold in warm water.

  3. Turn out the dessert.

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. Angelica + biscuittop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together69 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

  3. Cream + biscuittop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,235 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

  4. Sugar + biscuittop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  5. Cream + angelicatop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together237 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

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

What each ingredient does

Gooseberries
Provide the main tart fruit flavor and pulp that gives the cream its body.
Cream
Whisked to stiffness, it gives the dessert a light, airy, creamy texture.
Gelatine
Sets the fruit cream so it holds its shape when turned out of the mold.
Sugar
Sweetens the tart gooseberries and balances their acidity.
Savoy finger biscuits
Line the mold sides, giving the charlotte a firm, absorbent edge and structure.

The step that matters

Pour the mixture when it just begins to set. Gelatine sets as it cools, so if the fruit cream is too cold and thick it will not fill the mold evenly, and if it is still liquid it can run out and leave gaps or a soft, unstable dessert.

Swap the angelica

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Angelicathe original
  4. Capersfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, sugar, wine, biscuit. 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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