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Onion Souffle

A baked dish of onions, white sauce, breadcrumbs, eggs, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Onion Souffle

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the mixture

  1. In a bowl, mix the white sauce, bread crumbs, salt, pepper, and chopped onions.

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

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a buttered baking dish.

  2. Bake for about 45 minutes until set and golden.

  3. Serve immediately.

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 + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Bread + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,676 recipes

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

  4. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Sauce + oniontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Sauce and onion barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,474 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
Whipped whites trap air, giving the soufflé its light, risen structure.
White sauce
Forms the thick, creamy base that holds the soufflé mixture together.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and add body, helping the mixture hold its shape.
Finely chopped cooked onions
Add savory flavor and moisture to the base.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Stiff whites are full of trapped air that gives the soufflé its rise. Folding gently keeps that air in; stirring or deflating the whites makes the result flat and dense.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sauce, bread, pepper, egg):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Tomatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sauce, bread, 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.

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