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Dessert

Vanilla Souffle

A light, airy vanilla-flavored custard baked into a golden soufflé.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Vanilla 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

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

Make the base

  1. In a bowl, mix the cornflour with a little milk to form a smooth paste.

  2. In a saucepan, melt the butter and add the remaining milk, sugar, and a pinch of salt.

  3. Heat the mixture until warm, then stir in the cornflour paste and vanilla flavouring.

Bake and serve

  1. In a separate bowl, beat the eggs until frothy, then fold them into the mixture.

  2. Pour the mixture into a greased baking dish and bake for 30-40 minutes until set and golden.

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 + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

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

  3. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Butter + vanillatop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,050 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Cornflour
Thickens the milk mixture into a smooth base that helps the soufflé hold its shape.
Eggs
Provide structure and lift as they set in the oven, giving the soufflé its body.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the cornflour thickens and the eggs set into.
Butter
Adds richness and a soft, tender texture to the base.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps with browning on the surface.

The step that matters

Fold the eggs gently into the mixture. Beaten egg whites trap air that gives the soufflé its rise; overmixing or deflating them while folding leaves the result 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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