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Lemon Souffle
The yolks of six eggs, six ounces of sugar, grated rind of one lemon; beat well, then add the whites beaten to a stiff froth, also the juice of a lemon. Put into a pudding dish and bake twenty minutes. Serve with a sauce made of three eggs, the juice of one lemon, and half of the rind grated.
The baked portion is a straightforward egg-foam pudding, but the accompanying sauce is the problem: three eggs beaten with lemon juice and rind, with no instruction to cook them at all.
- The sauce is raw eggAs written, the sauce is uncooked whole egg thinned with acid and served over a pudding that has already left the oven. Lemon juice does not pasteurise egg, and nothing in the method brings it near the 160F at which Salmonella is reliably killed. Use a current recipe for a cooked lemon sauce or custard, or serve the pudding plain.
- Why the omission is not a typoWhy the omission cannot be filled in -- Some sauces of this type were finished over hot water, whisked to a foam, but this text never says so, and the quantities give no clue to temperature or timing. There is no way to follow the instruction as printed and arrive at a safe result.
- Six ounces of sugarThat is weight, not volume: roughly 170 g, or a little under a cup of granulated sugar.
- "A pudding dish"The text specifies nothing beyond this; a deep straight-sided baking dish is the likely intent. This is not a modern collared souffle mould, and no water bath is indicated.
- Oven heatNo temperature is given. A moderate oven, around 350F, is a reasonable modern equivalent for a twenty-minute bake of a mixture like this.
- No starch, no butterThere is no flour, milk or butter here, which makes this a meringue-and-yolk foam rather than a true souffle. It rises fast, colours quickly and collapses within a few minutes of leaving the oven.
- Order of mixingAdding the lemon juice after the beaten whites, as directed, means the acid hits the foam last. Fold it in with as few strokes as possible; overworking at this stage deflates the whites and the pudding bakes flat.
- YieldSix eggs gives about six modest servings, spooned out at once.
"Souffle" is simply the French past participle of souffler, to blow or puff. Lemon was a common flavouring for such dishes because rind and juice were cheap, kept reasonably well, and provided a sharpness that plain sugared egg badly needs. The casual presentation of an uncooked egg sauce here is a fair reminder that the germ theory of foodborne illness reached domestic kitchens well after it reached laboratories.