Charlotte (cake)

Charlotte is the name for two different desserts, a warm and a cold. The commonality is that both are prepared in a form that is lined with ladyfingers or sponge cake slices, earlier than originally with slices of white bread. More common today is the cold version, which is known as Malakoff Torte in Austria.

The baked Charlotte applicable in their country of origin England as a variant of a pudding and is the forerunner of the cold dessert. Best known is the apple Charlotte. For this purpose, the mold is covered with greased bread slices, it boiled apples and about more slices of bread or bread crumbs come. After baking, the Charlotte is overthrown and served warm.

Eponym of baked Charlotte was supposedly that of King George III. , Sophie Charlotte of Mecklenburg -Strelitz (1744-1818) wife. The term for this Charlotte dining immersed in English cookbooks first end of the 18th century, in France a few years later.

Cold Charlotte

The cold Charlotte was probably created by the famous French chef Marie -Antoine Carême beginning of the 19th century in London and is a modification of the older recipe of warm fruit Charlotte. He named his dessert Charlotte à la parisienne; it was later called in France Charlotte russe and is internationally known by this name.

For this dessert a lined with ladyfingers or sponge cake mold is filled with a mass of whipped cream and Bavarian cream classic. Then, the Charlotte is cooled until it is fixed. Before serving it is overthrown. There are now numerous recipe variations of the cold Charlotte with its own nickname, some with fruit puree, jelly, ice cream or alcohol. A variant is the Charlotte Malakoff with chocolate glaze.

In Austria the dessert under the name Malakoff Torte is known. It was in honor of the French Marshal Aimable Pélissier so named the 1855 nicknamed Duc de Malakoff received after the successful storming of the Russian fortress of Malakoff.

Swell

• Alan Davidson: The Oxford Companion to Food, 2nd. ed Oxford 2006, article Charlotte, p.159
• Hering's Dictionary of Food, 23 edition 2001, article Charlotte