charlotte russe

plural charlottes russes · plural charlottes russe · plural charlotte russes

1. A dessert of custard or whipped cream enclosed in sponge cake, often in the form of ladyfingers.First known use mid 19th c.

   But people don't think of training cooks, though they train ballet-girls, sempstresses, and bonnet-makers. A good Charlotte Russe is a higher effort of talent than a bonnet.

   1867 March 9, “Lady Llanover’s Good Cookery”, in The Saturday Review of Politics, Literature, Science, and Art, volume 23, number 593, London: Published at the office, […], →OCLC, page 312, column 2

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   And Mrs. Newcome was not unkind: and if Clive had been really a young duke, I am sure he would have had the best bed-room at Marble Hill, and not one of the far-off little rooms in the boys' wing; I am sure he would have had jellies and Charlottes Russes, instead of mere broth, chicken and batter pudding as fell to his lot; […]

   1854, Arthur Pendennis [pseudonym; William Makepeace Thackeray], “Clive’s Uncles”, in The Newcomes: Memoirs of a Most Respectable Family, volume I, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], →OCLC, page 51

   Cod and oyster sauce; smelt tossed with eggs, and made piquant with a squeeze of lemon (don't forget the lemon); chocolate custards, and a proper variety of puff-pâtés, blancmange, jellies, ice-creams, and Charlotte russe, are not bad to take, and, moreover, commend themselves to the pious conscience, for they are not forbidden by pope or council.

   1857 February 28, “Lenten Fast of Fashion”, in Harper’s Weekly. A Journal of Civilization, volume I, number 9, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, publishers, […], →OCLC, page 131, column 4

   When we reflect on the peanuts, oranges, soda water, cream cakes, bananas, claret punch, oysters, lemonade, Welch rare bits, ale, chicken and lobster salad, lager, pie, charlotte russe, ice cream, and cake and so forth, which are nightly mingled in the undergraduate's stomach, we are unavoidably led to remember that Blair is said to be the best undertaker in the city, though Hoadly and Co. are perhaps more handy for the student trade.

   1871 April 26, “Extracts from The Yale Courant. Published Every Week during Term Time. Editors, Class of ’71: C. R. Dudley, H. R. Elliot, H. Mansfield.”, in The College Courant. A Weekly Journal Devoted to College Interests, Science, and Literature, volume VIII, number 17, New Haven, Conn.: Charles C. Chatfield & Co, publishers, published 29 April 1871, →OCLC, page 203, column 1

   The Bavarian creams all make good charlottes-russe, the peach Bavarian making an especially delicious one. Sometimes these mixtures are frozen, and put into charlotte molds; the cake is formed in molds a trifle larger.

   1876, Mary F[oote] Henderson, “Bavarian Creams”, in Practical Cooking and Dinner Giving. […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, publishers. […], →OCLC, page 283

   There was a bakery store to one side of it which sold beautiful charlotte russes with red candied cherries on their whipped-cream tops for those who were rich enough to buy.

   1943, Betty Smith, chapter XVI, in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, →OCLC; 2nd edition, New York, N.Y.; London: Harper & Brothers, 1943, →OCLC, page 120