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Dessert

Steamed Vanilla Souffle

A light, airy vanilla-flavored soufflé baked until golden.

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 ↓

Steamed 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.

Make the base

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Dredge in the flour, then add the milk and stir until thickened.

  3. Remove from heat and add the sugar, yolks of eggs, and vanilla essence.

  4. Let the mixture cool.

Assemble and bake

  1. Just before baking, fold in the stiffly whipped egg whites.

  2. Pour into a well-greased souffle dish lined with buttered paper.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for 20 to 30 minutes.

  4. For best results, place the souffle on a baking tin in the lower half of the oven, then move to the top half for the last 4 to 5 minutes to brown.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + vanillatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Egg whites
Whipped to foam, they trap air that lifts the soufflé as it bakes.
Egg yolks
Enrich the base and help set the custard as it cooks.
Flour
Thickens the butter and milk into a stable base that holds the whipped air.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the flour thickens into a smooth sauce.
Butter
Enriches the base and adds flavour along with the flour roux.
Castor sugar
Sweetens the base and adds body to the mixture.

The step that matters

Fold in the egg whites. Whites must be stiffly whipped and folded in gently just before baking. Overmixing deflates the trapped air, and waiting too long lets the foam collapse, so the soufflé will not rise well.

Swap the vanilla

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

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

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