Why it works: Cinnamon and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,950 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓
Souffles
Ingredients
Directions
Make the custard base
Boil ½ pint of thin cream with cinnamon, lemon peel, and sugar.
Remove from heat and let cool.
In a saucepan, melt ½ lb of butter and mix in 1 tablespoon of flour.
Strain the cooled cream into the butter and flour mixture.
Stir in the beaten yolks of 4 eggs.
Mix over low heat without boiling until well combined.
Remove from heat and gently fold in the beaten whites of 5 eggs.
Prepare the mold
Butter a mold and decorate the inside with dried fruit.
Pour the mixture in.
Cover with buttered paper and tie a cloth over it.
Steam and serve
Boil for 1.5 hours.
Remove the pudding from the saucepan 5 minutes before turning it out of the mold.
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.
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Cinnamon + lemontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together7,950 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,341 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Cinnamon + sugartop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together30,779 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Cinnamon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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
- Yolks thicken the base and whites, folded in, lighten the mixture and help it rise.
- Butter
- Enriches the base with fat, adding richness and a smooth, tender texture.
- Flour
- Thickens the butter and cream mixture so it holds together before the eggs are added.
- Thin cream
- Adds moisture and richness, giving the mixture a soft, creamy body.
The step that matters
Folding in the egg whites. Whites hold air that gives the soufflé its lift. Folding gently keeps that air in; stirring or overmixing deflates the batter and produces a dense pudding.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, cinnamon, sugar, butter, flour, egg):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Figfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against cream, cinnamon, sugar, butter, flour, 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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