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Dessert

Omelet Souffle

A light, airy souffle made from beaten egg whites folded into a sweet yolk mixture, baked until set.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Omelet Souffle

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the eggs

  1. Separate the whites from the yolks of the eggs.

  2. Beat the egg whites in a bowl until they form stiff peaks.

  3. In another bowl, beat the yolks with the powdered sugar and orange-flower water until well combined.

Fold and bake

  1. Quickly fold the yolk mixture into the beaten egg whites to avoid deflating them.

  2. Grease a round tin with fresh butter and pour the mixture into it.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) until set, checking occasionally through the oven door.

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. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Sugar + orangetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

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

  4. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  5. Orange + buttertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,301 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

Sugar and orange barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,212 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
Whites trap air for lift and structure; yolks add richness and set into a tender body.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the omelette and dissolves easily into the yolks for a smooth base.
Orange-flower water
Adds a floral aroma that flavours the omelette.
Fresh butter
Greases the tin so the omelette releases cleanly and adds richness to the crust.

The step that matters

Fold the yolk mixture into the whites quickly. Egg whites are foam held by trapped air. Slow or heavy folding knocks out that air, so the omelette deflates and bakes flat and dense instead of rising light.

Swap the orange

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

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

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