Who needs a song for Charlotte when we have a ‘charlotte’ cake?

Mayor Jennifer Roberts thinks we need a song for Charlotte. I think what we really need is a cake.

Charlotte, we ought to own the charlotte. It’s a little British, a little French, a kissing cousin to trifles, tiramisu, bread puddings and summer puddings. What’s not to love? It isn’t hard to make and you can flavor it almost any way you want. It’s less baking and more of a construction project, and isn’t that perfect for us, too?

Like Charlotte itself, the charlotte is sometimes misunderstood, underestimated or dismissed as behind the times. How else to explain that in 27 years of writing about food in Charlotte, I have never tackled a charlotte?

Neither has Ashley Bivens Boyd, the pastry chef for both 300 East and Heritage Food & Drink in Waxhaw. When I reached out for her advice on a charlotte for Charlotte, she admitted she’d never made one either.

For Valentine’s Day, we both agreed: It’s high time we tried. So we tackled it together, in a string of emails, Facebook messages and phone calls, putting together Boyd’s spot-on taste inspirations and my knowledge of what works in a home kitchen to come up with a charlotte that sings “Charlotte.”

Crowning achievement

The original, the apple charlotte, was named for our namesake, Queen Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, wife of King George III and a supporter of apple growers.

So what is a charlotte? At heart, it’s a mold lined with bread or cake and filled with something. The apple charlotte is simple, sort of an apple bread pudding, while a Charlotte Russe is fancier: A ring of ladyfingers, usually, filled with mousse, Bavarian cream or pastry cream.

(Editor’s note: There are different versions, detailed in Purvis’ original article.)

Your move, Queen

Looking for a version of a Charlotte Russe that would make a fitting Valentine for Charlotte, I considered chocolate, raspberry and strawberry versions. I even looked at Paula Deen’s version. Finally, I turned to Ashley Bivens Boyd in a Facebook message: Psst. Got a good charlotte?

After admitting she didn’t have that one in her vast repertoire (“full disclosure: I’ve never made a charlotte”), her ideas started coming: “I’m more intrigued by the apple charlotte that seems to be more closely tied to Queen Charlotte. What about a hybrid version with ladyfingers, milk chocolate and/or caramelized white chocolate bavarian, and apple compote?”

“Brown butter ladyfinger sponge. And Carriage House apple brandy.”

“Now I’m hungry. And I want to make this.”

I knew readers would probably not make ladyfingers (called boudoir biscuits in England, and let’s not speculate on that). But apple brandy made in Lenoir? N.C. apples? And, oooh, what’s this about caramelized white chocolate? I turned the apple compote into glazed apple slices, wrote up a recipe and emailed it to Boyd.

She emailed back, with chef tricks, suggestions and more advice: Add a little lemon juice when you caramelize the apple slices. Instead of browning butter, save a step by melting it with the brown sugar. Here are some tips for caramelizing white chocolate in the oven. After you caramelize it, keep it from seizing by melting it in a little cream.

Armed with her advice and a lot of scribbled notes, I hit the kitchen. There were bumps and adjustments. Getting ladyfingers to stand up straight is a job for four hands, although I finally hit on a trick: Use the crispy kind, called Savoiardi, around the edges and brace them with a bulwark of the soft, cakey kind on the bottom. (Both are usually in the produce section, near the berries).

I glazed thin apple wedges with an easy brandy caramel to decorate the top, then used the caramel to flavor a top layer of whipped cream.

The best trick of all: That oven-browned white chocolate. Oh, where has this been all my life? It’s easy and it adds a little complexity to white chocolate, which can taste a little like Easter candy. Make sure you get white chocolate with cocoa butter in the ingredients: White candy coating or morsels won’t work.

Yes, the recipe is a little long. It’s the product of a pastry chef and a food writer, so what did you expect? I simplified as much as possible. But for Valentine’s, isn’t it worth a little effort? If you don’t want to wrangle ladyfingers, you could just make the caramelized white chocolate Bavarian and spoon it into dessert glasses. Heck, skip the dessert glasses – you could eat that caramelized white chocolate straight off the pan.

Quaking a little, I took a slice by 300 East and Boyd dodged out of the kitchen to grab a fork: Chewy apples, crisp ladyfingers, fluffy Bavarian. She declared it a success and agreed that working together on a recipe was a fun challenge.

“What actually surprised me the most? Thinking about how I’ve done this for 20 years and I’ve never made a charlotte. But I think I’m going to now.”

You’re welcome, Charlotte. Who needs a song?

Want the recipe? Find it here.

The original version of this story ran at CharlotteObserver.com.

Photo: Diedra Laird/Charlotte Observer

This story was originally published February 9, 2017 at 8:00 PM with the headline "Who needs a song for Charlotte when we have a ‘charlotte’ cake?."