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Dessert

Sago Souffle

A sweet pudding made with milk, butter, sugar, sago, almonds, eggs, and almond extract, baked into a souffle.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Sago Souffle

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the base

  1. In a saucepan, combine milk, butter, sugar, sago, and chopped almonds.

  2. Cook over medium heat for 15 minutes, stirring constantly.

  3. Remove from heat and let cool.

Finish and bake

  1. Beat the eggs and gradually add them to the mixture, stirring well.

  2. Flavor with almond extract.

  3. Pour into a pudding dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30 minutes.

  4. Sift powdered sugar over the souffle and serve immediately in the baking dish.

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. Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

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

  3. Milk + almondtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,800 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Provide structure and lift, setting into a light, tender body as they bake.
Pearl sago
Thickens the milk as it cooks, giving the soufflé its body and creamy texture.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, tender mouthfeel.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the sago thickens and the eggs set into.
Sugar
Sweetens the base and contributes to browning on the surface.
Blanched almonds
Add nutty flavor and a fine texture throughout the custard.

The step that matters

Cooling before adding the eggs. If the mixture is still hot when the beaten eggs go in, they can scramble instead of blending smoothly. Letting it cool first, and adding the eggs gradually while stirring, keeps the batter smooth so it rises evenly when baked.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Pecansfits about as well
  2. Almondthe original
  3. Cocoafits less well
  4. Walnutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, butter, sugar, egg. 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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