Skip to main content
Main

Chicken Souffle

A baked chicken soufflé made with cream sauce, breadcrumbs, egg yolks, and beaten egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Chicken Souffle

Oven, in the book's wordsA very quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the base

  1. Make a cream sauce by melting butter and whisking in flour over medium heat.

  2. Gradually add hot milk, stirring constantly until thickened.

  3. Stir in breadcrumbs and cook for 2 minutes.

Assemble

  1. Remove from heat and mix in pepper, salt, parsley, chicken, and egg yolks.

  2. Beat egg whites to stiff peaks and fold into the mixture.

  3. Spoon mixture into buttered and heated pans.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) for 10 minutes or in one pan for 25 minutes.

  2. Serve immediately to prevent falling.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Chicken + milktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,389 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

Flour and butter 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 whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they trap air that expands in the oven to lift the souffle.
Egg yolks
Enrich the base and help bind the chicken and sauce into a set custard.
Flour
Thickens the butter and milk into a cream sauce that holds the mixture together.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the cream sauce, adding moisture and softness.
Chicken
Provides the main body and savory flavor of the souffle.
Breadcrumbs
Absorb liquid from the sauce and add body to the mixture.

The step that matters

Fold the beaten egg whites into the mixture. Egg whites whipped to stiff peaks trap air that expands in the oven and lifts the souffle. Overmixing or stirring vigorously deflates the foam, so the souffle rises poorly and falls sooner.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Cinnamonfits about as well
  4. Tarragonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, flour, butter, milk, pepper, 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.

You might also like

Chicken BrothChicken Broth257 recipesChicken SoupChicken Soup156 recipesCreamed ChickenCreamed Chicken89 recipesChicken PanadaChicken Panada75 recipes