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Dessert

Omelet Souffle'

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

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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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 ↓

Omelet Souffle'

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the base

  1. Mix sugar, butter, flour, and milk in a saucepan.

  2. Heat over medium heat, stirring until thickened.

  3. Remove from heat and let cool.

Add the eggs

  1. Beat the egg yolks and mix them into the cooled mixture.

  2. Beat the egg whites until stiff and fold them into the mixture.

  3. Pour into a well-buttered pudding dish.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake at 400°F (200°C) until set.

  2. Serve warm, with or without sauce.

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. Flour + milktop 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

Eggs
Yolks enrich and thicken the base; whipped whites lift the mixture and give the soufflé its airy structure.
Flour
Starch thickens the milk mixture into a stable base that holds the whipped eggs.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving a tender texture and helping the dish release from its pudding dish.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the flour thickens, adding moisture and a soft custard-like body.
Sugar
Sweetens the base and contributes to gentle browning as the soufflé bakes.

The step that matters

Fold the whipped egg whites in gently. Stiff whites hold air that makes the soufflé rise. Stirring or deflating them vigorously knocks out those bubbles, so the bake comes out dense and flat.

“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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