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Dessert

Chocolate Souffle

A steamed chocolate dessert made with chocolate, flour, sugar, butter, milk, eggs, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Chocolate Souffle

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. In a small saucepan, combine the milk and grated chocolate. Simmer gently until dissolved.

  2. Melt the butter in a separate pan, then stir in the flour and add the chocolate mixture. Boil well.

  3. Let the mixture cool slightly, then add the vanilla and sugar. Incorporate the egg yolks one at a time, beating well.

Fold and steam

  1. Gently fold in the stiffly whisked egg whites.

  2. Pour the mixture into a well-greased mold and steam gently for 45 to 50 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve with custard or sweet 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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Chocolate + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

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

Egg whites
Whisked into foam, they trap air that lifts the soufflé as it steams.
Flour
Thickens the chocolate base so it can hold the whisked air.
Egg yolks
Enrich the base and help bind it to the whites.
Chocolate
Provides the main chocolate flavour and dark colour.
Butter
Adds fat for a smooth, rich texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the base and balances the bitter chocolate.

The step that matters

Gently fold in the stiffly whisked egg whites. The whites hold the air that makes the soufflé rise. Stirring or deflating them vigorously knocks out those bubbles, so the soufflé steams up flat and dense instead of light.

“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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