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Dessert

Orange Souffle

A dessert of sliced oranges layered with custard and topped with beaten egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,696 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Orange Souffle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the oranges

  1. Peel and slice the oranges.

  2. In a glass dish, layer the oranges and sugar until all the oranges are used.

  3. Let the mixture stand for two hours.

Make the custard

  1. In a saucepan, combine egg yolks, milk, and sugar to taste and cook to make a soft-boiled custard.

  2. Add grated orange peel to the custard.

  3. Pour the custard over the oranges when cool enough.

Top and finish

  1. Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks.

  2. Stir the sugar into the beaten egg whites.

  3. Spread the egg white mixture over the pudding.

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. Orange + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,696 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  2. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  4. Orange + sugartop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Sugar and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Oranges
Provide the main fruit flavor and juice that sweetens and moistens the base.
Egg yolks
Thicken the milk into a soft custard that sets the base.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard, carrying the egg yolks.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks to form a light, airy topping.
Sugar
Sweetens the oranges, custard and meringue topping.

The step that matters

Beating the egg whites to stiff peaks. Egg whites trap air only when fully whipped and free of fat or yolk; under-whipped or greasy whites stay runny and will not give the topping its light, risen texture.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Orangethe original

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