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Dessert

Vanilla Soufflage Cakes

A light cake made from beaten egg whites, vanilla, and powdered sugar, baked after drying.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Vanilla Soufflage Cakes

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.

Prepare

  1. In a bowl, combine the egg whites and a little vanilla extract.

  2. Gradually mix in powdered sugar until the mixture forms a stiff paste.

  3. Roll out the paste to ¼ inch thick and cut into desired shapes.

  4. Grease some plates with butter and place the cut shapes on them.

Bake and finish

  1. Let the cakes dry for 20 minutes before baking in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C).

  2. Once baked, you can ice, pipe, or decorate the cakes as desired.

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. Vanilla + sugartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Vanilla + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,050 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Vanilla and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Whip-free binder that gives the paste body and helps the shapes hold together.
Fine powdered sugar
Sweetness and bulk that stiffens the egg whites into a workable paste.
Vanilla extract
Adds aroma and a warm vanilla flavour.

The step that matters

Letting the cakes dry for 20 minutes before baking. Resting lets the surface of the shaped paste dry slightly, which helps the cut shapes keep their outline in the oven instead of spreading as they heat.

“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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