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Dessert

Potato Flour Souffle

A soufflé made from potato flour, sugar, butter, milk or cream, lemon rind, and eggs.

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

Potato Flour 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. Combine potato flour, pounded sugar, butter, salt, lemon or orange rind, and milk or cream in a saucepan.

  2. Stir over medium heat until it boils, ensuring the butter remains smooth.

  3. Remove from heat and mix in egg yolks.

Prepare and bake

  1. Whisk egg whites until firm.

  2. Fold the egg whites into the mixture gently.

  3. Prepare a soufflé dish by lining it with buttered parchment paper.

  4. Pour the mixture into the dish.

  5. Place the dish on a baking sheet in a 350°F (175°C) oven.

  6. Bake for 45 minutes, occasionally rotating for even heat.

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. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Potato + lemontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,230 recipes

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

  5. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

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

Potato flour
Forms the thick base that holds the soufflé's structure before baking.
Egg yolks
Enrich the base and add richness and setting power to the custard.
Egg whites
Whipped to firm peaks, they provide lift and an airy, light texture.
Butter
Adds fat for smoothness and a rich, tender crumb.
Milk or cream
Supplies liquid that cooks with the flour into a smooth, thick base.

The step that matters

Folding the egg whites. Folding gently keeps the air trapped in the whipped whites. Overmixing deflates the batter, so the soufflé rises less during baking.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Arrowrootfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Leekfits about as well
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter, lemon, milk, 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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