Name: Cheese Souffle
Ingredients: ½ pound cheese, grated; 3 large eggs, separated; 1 teacup (about ½ cup) cream; ¼ teaspoon salt

Why it works: Cheese and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,655 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cheese Souffle

Ingredients

½ pound cheese, grated
3 large eggs, separated
1 teacup (about ½ cup) cream
¼ teaspoon salt

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.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Grate the cheese and set aside.

Make the soufflé

In a bowl, mix the yolks of the eggs with the cream and salt.
Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.
Fold the beaten egg whites into the cheese mixture just before baking.
Pour the mixture into a greased baking dish and bake 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.

Cheese + creamtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,655 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together42,166 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Cheese + eggtop 28% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,253 recipes

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

Egg and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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: Whites trapped with air provide the rising structure, and yolks add richness and set the custard base.
Cheese: Adds fat and savory flavor, and its proteins help set the soufflé structure as it bakes.
Cream: Adds fat and moisture, giving the base a smooth, tender texture.

The step that matters

Fold the beaten egg whites into the cheese mixture just before baking. Beaten egg whites hold air that makes the soufflé rise. Folding gently keeps that air in; stirring or waiting too long lets the foam collapse and the soufflé bake flat and dense.

“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.