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Dessert

Apples in Charlotte Russe

A baked dessert of apples served in a bread-lined mold, topped with croutons and bread slices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Apples in Charlotte Russe

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Cook the apples

  1. Melt butter in a stew pan over medium heat.

  2. Add apples, sugar, and nutmeg; cook until apples are tender.

  3. Transfer apples to a baking dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) until done.

  4. Drain the apples and stir them on the fire for ten minutes.

Assemble and bake

  1. Butter a round mold and line it with croutons.

  2. Fill the mold with the cooked apples and cover with the soft part of bread slices.

  3. Bake in a moderate oven for about 25 minutes.

Serve

  1. Invert the mold onto a dish and remove it to serve hot.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Apple + nutmegtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,790 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Apple + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,790 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Nutmeg + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,997 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,706 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Apples
Soften into the filling and supply the main body and moisture of the dessert.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, and helps the bread and croutons brown on the outside.
Bread slices
Form the soft outer casing that holds the apple filling in its shape.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the tartness of the apples.

The step that matters

Drain the apples and stir them on the fire for ten minutes.. Excess liquid from the cooked apples would make the bread casing soggy and the filling loose. Drying them over heat concentrates the flavor and helps the charlotte hold its shape when turned out.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (apple, butter, sugar, bread):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Clovefits about as well
  4. Gingerfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, butter, sugar, bread. 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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