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Dessert

Vanilla Souffle

A light, airy dessert made with egg yolks, whites, milk, flour, vanilla, and sugar, baked in a water bath.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and milk 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

Oven, in the book's wordsA brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. In a saucepan, combine flour and salt, then stir over low heat until mixed.

  2. Gradually add milk and sugar, stirring until boiling and thickened.

  3. Remove from heat and let cool slightly, then mix in egg yolks and vanilla essence.

Assemble and cook

  1. Whisk egg whites to stiff peaks and gently fold into the mixture.

  2. Butter a mold and pour in the souffle mixture, dust with caster sugar.

  3. Place the mold in a pan of boiling water, steam for 30 minutes.

Serve

  1. Once cooked, turn the souffle onto a hot dish and 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. Vanilla + milktop 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. Vanilla + sugartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Vanilla + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Vanilla and sugar 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

Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they trap air and give the soufflé its light, risen structure.
Egg yolks
Enrich the base and help it set into a tender, custardy texture when heated.
Flour
Thickens the milk base, giving the mixture body so it can hold the whipped whites.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard that the flour thickens and the yolks enrich.
Butter
Greases the mold so the soufflé releases cleanly after cooking.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whisked whites hold air that gives the soufflé its rise. Folding gently keeps that air in; vigorous stirring deflates the mixture and leads to a flat, dense result.

Swap the vanilla

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

  1. Vanillathe original
  2. Raisinfits about as well
  3. Figfits less well
  4. Coconutfits less well

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