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Dessert

Custard Souffle

A baked custard soufflé made with milk, butter, sugar, flour, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By North End Club (Chicago, Ill.) · 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 ↓

Custard Souffle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine two scant tablespoons of butter, two scant tablespoons of sugar, two scant tablespoons of flour, one cup of milk, and four eggs.

  2. Let the milk boil. Heat flour and butter together, adding them gradually to the boiling milk.

Make the custard

  1. Cook 8 minutes, stirring often.

  2. Beat sugar and yolks of eggs together, add to the cooked mixture and set aside to cool.

  3. When cool, beat whites of eggs stiff and fold into the custard.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a buttered pudding dish in a moderate oven.

  2. Serve immediately with cream sauce.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

833Calories
27 gProtein
26 gFat
120 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By North End Club (Chicago, Ill.). 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. See the original page.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Milk
Forms the liquid base that thickens into the custard when cooked.
Flour
Thickens the boiling milk into a smooth, stable custard base.
Eggs
Yolks enrich and set the custard; whipped whites give the soufflé its light, risen structure.
Butter
Adds richness and smooth flavour to the custard base.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and balances the richness of the eggs and butter.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. The custard must be cool before the whites are folded in, since heat deflates the foam. Fold gently to keep the trapped air, which lifts the soufflé in the oven.

“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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