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Dessert

Vanilla Soufle

A light, airy custard-like dessert made with eggs, milk, butter, flour, sugar, vanilla, and salt.

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 ↓

Vanilla Soufle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Butter a 1½ pint soufflé tin and tie a band of paper around it, extending 2 inches above the top.

  2. Melt 1 oz of butter, then add the flour and mix well.

  3. Stir in the milk and sugar, cooking over low heat until thickened.

Make the soufflé

  1. Remove from heat and add the yolks of 3 eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.

  2. Beat the 4 egg whites to stiff peaks and gently fold into the mixture.

  3. Add the salt and vanilla essence, then pour into the prepared tin.

  4. Steam for 25 minutes.

Serve

  1. Turn out onto a hot dish and serve immediately with custard poured around.

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. Milk + buttertop 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

Eggs
Egg whites whipped to stiff peaks give the soufflé its light, airy structure, and yolks add richness.
Flour
Cooked with butter and milk, flour thickens the base so it can hold the whipped egg whites.
Milk
Milk forms the liquid base of the thickened sauce that the eggs are folded into.
Butter
Butter, cooked with flour, forms the roux that gives the base its body and richness.
Castor sugar
Sugar sweetens the base and adds a little body to the thickened mixture.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whites beaten to stiff peaks trap air that makes the soufflé rise. Folding gently keeps that air in; stirring or deflating the mixture leaves a dense result.

Swap the vanilla

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

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

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