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Pineapple Charlotte
A charlotte mould should be lined with paper and some lady-fingers pointed on one side and arranged like a rosette with their glazed sides at the bottom of the mould; then place some long thin biscuits the same height as the mould, around the sides, standing upright, and place the mould in pounded ice. Mix with a pint of pine-apple syrup, three-quarters of an ounce of dissolved gelatine, a small quantity of grated lemon-peel and the juice of an orange; strain the liquor through a sieve into a sugar-boiler and stir it over a fire until it becomes of the consistency of cream, then remove and mix with it half a pint of whipped cream and half a pound of either fresh pineapple cut into small pieces, or the preserved pineaple. Then fill the lined mould with this preparation and leave it for about an hour to become set. Turn the charlotte out onto a folded napkin, and serve.
A cold moulded charlotte in the French manner, built in a lined tin and set with gelatine rather than baked. Two things decide whether it succeeds: what kind of pineapple goes in, and how firmly the gelatine is judged.
- Fresh pineapple will stop the gelatine settingRaw pineapple contains bromelain, a protease that breaks down gelatine and leaves the filling soupy. The recipe offers fresh or preserved as equals; they are not. Use canned or preserved pineapple, which has been heat-treated, or bring fresh fruit to a simmer for a few minutes and cool it before folding in.
- Gelatine quantityThree-quarters of an ounce is about 21 g, roughly three 7 g envelopes of powdered gelatine for a pint of syrup plus half a pint of cream. That is a firm set, deliberately so, because the charlotte must stand unsupported once turned out. Older leaf gelatine varied in strength, so err toward the full amount if you want clean slices.
- Do not let the syrup boilHeat the syrup and gelatine only until it thickens slightly — the "consistency of cream" — then take it off. Prolonged boiling weakens gelatine's setting power, and a hot syrup will deflate the whipped cream when the two are combined.
- Fold at the right temperatureThe gelatine mixture should be cool and just beginning to thicken before the whipped cream goes in. Warm, and the cream deflates; already set, and it will streak. Note that the recipe puts the pounded ice under the lined mould, not under the mixing bowl.
- VesselsA charlotte mould is a plain-sided tin about 6 inches across, slightly wider at the top than the base; a soufflé dish or a straight-sided cake tin lined with parchment works. A "sugar-boiler" is an unlined copper pan — use any nonreactive saucepan, since the orange and lemon are acidic.
- Ladyfingers and "long thin biscuits"The rosette at the bottom is trimmed ladyfingers laid glazed side down; the upright ring is the same biscuit cut level with the rim. Savoiardi are the modern equivalent and are sturdier than soft sponge fingers, which is what you want for a mould that has to hold its shape.
- Setting timeAn hour on ice is optimistic for a mould this size. Give it four hours in the refrigerator, or overnight, then dip the tin briefly in warm water before inverting.
- The napkinTurning the charlotte out onto a folded napkin was conventional service for such dishes; the cloth may also take up moisture weeping from the biscuits and keep the base from sliding on the platter.
- YieldThe quantities here fill a mould serving roughly six to eight in wedges.
The charlotte in this form — biscuits lining a mould, a cold cream filling, turned out and served without baking — is generally traced to Antonin Carême in the early nineteenth century, who is credited with the version known as charlotte russe; it is a cousin rather than a descendant of the older baked apple charlotte. By the close of the century, when Oscar Tschirky was maître d'hôtel at the Waldorf, the moulded charlotte was standard grand-hotel dessert work: it could be built in the morning, held on ice, and unmoulded to order for a large dining room. The pineapple is the period detail. The Caribbean and Florida trade had made the fruit obtainable in New York, but it was still expensive enough to signal a good table, and pineapple put up in sugar was a pantry staple precisely because the fresh fruit did not keep.