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Dessert

Hot Sweet Entremets

A hot dessert made with vanilla, sugar, flour, butter, eggs, Swiss roll slices, and served with sabayon or wine sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Hot Sweet Entremets

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Combine the vanilla pod and loaf sugar in a saucepan.

  2. Pour boiling water over the mixture of flour and butter, stirring vigorously for a few minutes.

  3. Remove the vanilla pod and let the mixture cool slightly.

  4. Beat in the egg yolks and the whisked egg whites until well combined.

Assemble and steam

  1. Line a buttered mold with thin slices of Swiss roll.

  2. Chill the mold for a few minutes, then fill it with the souffle mixture.

  3. Steam for about an hour.

Serve

  1. Turn out onto a hot dish and pour hot sabayon or wine sauce around it, but not over it.

  2. Serve hot.

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 + sugartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  5. Vanilla + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,050 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Flour
Forms the starch structure that holds the steamed mixture together as it sets.
Egg yolks
Add richness and help bind the mixture into a tender, custardy texture.
Egg whites
Whisked to foam, they lighten the mixture and give it a soufflé-like rise.
Butter
Adds fat for a soft, rich texture and a smooth mouthfeel.
Loaf sugar
Sweetens the mixture and adds to its tender texture.

The step that matters

Beat in the egg whites gently. Whisked egg whites trap air that gives the mixture its lift. Overbeating or vigorous stirring can collapse the foam, leaving a dense result after steaming.

Swap the vanilla

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

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

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