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Dessert

Coffee Souffle

A chilled coffee-based dessert made with gelatin, eggs, and sugar, folded with whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Gelatin and cream match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,628 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

Coffee Souffle

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Pour boiling coffee over gelatin in a bowl.

  2. Add milk and sugar, then cook in a double boiler until smooth.

  3. Stir in egg yolks, another ⅓ cup sugar, and salt; cook until thick like custard.

Set and serve

  1. Let cool, then fold in beaten egg whites.

  2. Pour mixture into molds and refrigerate until set.

  3. Serve with whipped cream.

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. Gelatin + creamtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  2. Sugar + gelatintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Coffee + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,202 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  5. Coffee + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,339 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

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

What each ingredient does

Gelatin
Sets the coffee mixture so it holds its shape when chilled.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness to the mixture.
Egg whites
Beaten and folded in to lighten the mixture and give it an airy texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the soufflé and balances the bitterness of the coffee.
Milk
Adds moisture and richness to the custard base.

The step that matters

Cook the custard until thick. Egg yolks thicken as they heat, but overheating can scramble them. Cooking gently in a double boiler keeps the custard smooth, and it must be thick enough to support the folded egg whites.

“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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