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A Fondu, or Cheese Souffle

A baked cheese soufflé made with milk, potato flour, butter, eggs, and grated cheese.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

A Fondu, or Cheese Souffle

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the base

  1. In a bowl, mix the potato flour with ½ cup of fresh milk until smooth.

  2. In a saucepan, heat ¾ cup of milk or cream and stir it into the mixture.

  3. Add the butter and stir until melted and well combined.

  4. Incorporate the egg yolks, salt, cayenne, and grated cheese into the mixture.

Bake

  1. Whisk the egg whites until firm and fold them into the batter gently.

  2. Pour the mixture into a baking dish and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 20 minutes.

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 + cheesetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  4. Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  5. Milk + cheesetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,426 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Whipped into foam, they trap air that lifts the soufflé as it bakes.
Egg yolks
Enrich the base and help it set into a custard-like structure.
Potato flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth base that holds the rising batter.
Grated cheese
Adds savoury flavour and richness to the batter.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, tender texture.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whisked whites hold air bubbles that make the soufflé rise. Folding gently keeps those bubbles intact; stirring vigorously deflates the batter and the soufflé falls flat.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Potatothe original
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Asparagusfits less well
  4. Tomatofits less well

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