Why it works: Egg and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Naple Biscuits, or Charlotte Russe
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the cakes
Bake two sponge cakes in round, deep patty pans and let them cool.
Cut out the inside of each cake, leaving a shell about ¼ inch thick.
Make the custard
In a bowl, beat the egg yolks and mix with boiling milk, sugar, and flavoring.
Pour the custard into the cake shells and top with jelly or jam.
Top and chill
In another bowl, beat the egg whites with powdered sugar until stiff peaks form and add flavoring.
Spread the meringue over the jelly and refrigerate 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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Egg + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked 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
- Sponge cakes
- Form the hollow shells that hold the custard and topping.
- Egg yolks
- Thicken the milk into a custard through gentle heat-setting.
- Egg whites
- Whipped with powdered sugar to form a stable, airy meringue topping.
- Boiling milk
- Dissolves the sugar and, with the yolks, forms the custard filling.
- Powdered sugar
- Sweetens the meringue and helps it hold stiff peaks.
The step that matters
Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks. Egg whites need to be whipped until stiff so they trap air and hold their shape as a meringue. Under-whipped whites will weep or slump over the filling.
“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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