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
Sweeten and flavor the cream.
Whip the cream until frothy.
Soak the gelatine in cold water.
Melt the gelatine on the stove.
Let the gelatine cool before adding it to the cream.
Assemble and chill
Line a dish with cake or ladyfingers.
Pour the cream mixture into the lined dish.
Set the dish on ice until ready to serve.
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.
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Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Thin cream
- Whipped into a light foam that gives the dessert its airy body.
- Gelatine
- Sets the cream so the filling holds its shape when served.
- Powdered sugar
- Sweetens the cream and dissolves easily into it without graininess.
- Cake or ladyfingers
- Form the lining around the filling and give it a firm, absorbent base.
The step that matters
Let the gelatine cool before adding it to the cream.. Hot liquid gelatine can deflate the air in whipped cream and thin the mixture, so it stays loose. Once it is only lukewarm and still fluid, it blends in evenly, and it sets the filling as it chills.
“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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