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Dessert

Apple Souffle

A baked or steamed dessert of apples, butter, bread crumbs, cream, and beaten egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Apple Souffle

Ingredients

Directions

Make the apple base

  1. Melt butter in a stewpan.

  2. Add apples, lemon peel, and nutmeg.

  3. Cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally until apples are soft.

  4. Remove the lemon peel.

  5. Mix in the hot apples, bread crumbs, and sugar to taste.

Add the eggs and cream

  1. Stir in the egg yolks, boiled cream, and brandy.

  2. Beat the egg whites until stiff.

  3. Fold the beaten egg whites into the hot apple mixture.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a buttered mold and bake or steam for about 20 minutes.

  2. Alternatively, line dariole molds with pastry, fill, and bake.

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. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  5. Apple + nutmegtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,790 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Apples
Cook down to a soft, flavourful base that gives the soufflé its body.
Egg yolks
Enrich the mixture and help it set as it cooks.
Egg whites
Beaten until stiff, they trap air so the soufflé rises and becomes light.
Fresh bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and add structure to the apple mixture.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture for a softer, smoother texture.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the apples and the mold.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Beaten whites hold the air that makes the soufflé rise. Stirring them in vigorously deflates the foam, so fold gently and keep the mixture from becoming too cool or too runny.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, lemon, nutmeg, bread, sugar, egg, cream):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Raspberryfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, lemon, nutmeg, bread, sugar, egg, cream. 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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