Skip to main content
Dessert

Chocolate Souffle

A baked chocolate soufflé made with butter, flour, milk, egg yolks, sugar, and grated chocolate.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Chocolate 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.

Make the base

  1. Heat the butter in a saucepan to make a roux.

  2. Stir in the flour and thin with the scalding milk as it thickens.

  3. Cook the mixture for 2 minutes.

  4. Combine the thickened milk with the beaten egg yolks and sugar.

  5. Beat the mixture for 1 minute.

  6. Add the grated chocolate and beat until the mixture cools.

  7. Cover the mixture to prevent hardening.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 30 minutes.

  2. Serve immediately with whipped cream.

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. Butter + milktop 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. Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Milk + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,128 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 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

Egg yolks
Enrich the base and help the soufflé set and turn rich when baked.
Flour
Thickens the butter and milk into a roux that gives the base body and structure.
Butter
Fat that forms the roux with the flour and adds richness.
Grated chocolate
Provides the main flavour and adds richness to the base.
Milk
Liquid that is thickened with the roux to form the soufflé base.

The step that matters

Cover the mixture to prevent hardening. A cooled base with a skin can stiffen and lose its smooth, airy texture, so covering it keeps the mixture soft and workable before baking.

“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.

You might also like

Chocolate CreamChocolate Cream171 recipesChocolate CookiesChocolate Cookies76 recipesChocolate FudgeChocolate Fudge55 recipesChocolate Drop CookiesChocolate Drop Cookies50 recipes