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Omelette Souffle

A light, airy omelette made with beaten egg whites folded into a milk and corn starch base, baked until puffed.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Omelette Souffle

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Separate the egg whites and yolks, beating them separately until very light.

Make the batter

  1. In a saucepan, heat the milk with the butter until melted.

  2. Stir in the corn starch until well combined.

  3. Mix the corn starch mixture with the egg yolks and add salt to taste.

  4. Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a buttered pudding dish and bake for 15 minutes.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Corn + walnuttop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together349 recipes

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

  3. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  4. Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,345 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Walnut + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Whites trap air for lightness, while yolks add richness and help set the custard.
Milk
Provides liquid that cooks with the starch and eggs into a tender, creamy base.
Corn starch
Thickens the milk mixture so it holds the folded egg whites before baking.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, flavorful texture.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Stirring instead of folding knocks out the air bubbles the whites hold, so the soufflé rises less and turns dense.

Swap the walnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, milk, corn, butter):

  1. Lima beansfits about as well
  2. Almondfits about as well
  3. Pecansfits about as well
  4. Walnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, corn, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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