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Veal Souffle

A light, airy veal dish folded with cream and egg whites, steamed in a buttered mold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,015 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Veal Souffle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the veal

  1. Pass the veal through a meat grinder 2 or 3 times, then pound it in a mortar.

  2. Gradually add the butter, white sauce (cold), and 3 egg yolks, one at a time.

  3. Season with salt, pepper, and nutmeg, then rub the mixture through a fine wire sieve until smooth.

Make the soufflé mixture

  1. Whip the cream lightly and whisk the remaining 2 egg whites to stiff peaks.

  2. Gently fold the whipped cream and egg whites into the veal puree.

Mould and steam

  1. Prepare a well-buttered mold, decorating it with sliced or chopped truffles if desired.

  2. Pour the mixture into the mold, cover with buttered paper, and steam gently for about 1 hour.

Serve

  1. Serve with Bechamel or Supreme sauce.

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. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Sauce + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Veal + truffletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together815 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  5. Butter + truffletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,209 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Veal
Forms the main body of the soufflé, giving it a delicate, savoury base once puréed.
Eggs
Egg yolks and whites bind the purée and set it, giving the soufflé its light structure.
Double cream
Whipped and folded in, it adds moisture and a lighter, softer texture.
Butter
Adds richness and smoothness to the purée and carries flavour.
White sauce
Adds moisture and body to the veal purée, helping it stay smooth and tender.

The step that matters

Folding in the whipped cream and egg whites. Folding gently keeps the air trapped in the whipped cream and egg whites. Stirring hard would deflate the mixture, leaving a dense soufflé instead of a light one.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, sauce, cream, butter, egg, truffle, pepper):

  1. Nutmegthe original
  2. Parsleyfits about as well
  3. Tarragonfits about as well
  4. Capersfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, sauce, cream, butter, egg, truffle, pepper. 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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