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Souffle, Simple
Sweeten and flavour a quarter of a pint of milk with lemon or vanilla, boil it, and stir into it quickly, when boiling, a table-spoonful of flour which has been smoothly mixed with another quarter of a pint of milk. Add a slice of fresh butter, draw the saucepan to the side of the fire, and stir the batter carefully till it thickens, then pour it into a basin. When nearly cold, add a dessert-spoonful of brandy and the well-beaten yolks of two eggs. Butter a cake-tin or deep pie-dish which the batter will only half fill, and put it in the oven till hot. Beat the whites of three eggs to a firm froth, and stir them briskly into the batter. Spread a layer of jam at the bottom of the dish, pour in the batter, and bake in a moderate oven. When the dish has risen high, and is nicely browned and firm throughout, it is done enough. Serve with the utmost expedition, or it will be spoiled. Time to bake the dish, about twenty-five minutes. Probable cost, 10d. Sufficient for four or five persons.
A panada soufflé — flour-thickened milk base, three whites to two yolks — which is the most forgiving of the sweet soufflés. The only real hazards are the folding and the walk to the table.
- The measurementsA quarter of a pint imperial is 5 fl oz, so about 2/3 cup; you need that twice, 1 1/4 cups of milk in all. A dessert-spoonful is roughly 2 teaspoons of brandy. "A slice of fresh butter" means about 1 tablespoon, unsalted.
- Moderate oven350°F (175°C), with the rack in the lower third so the top does not set before the middle rises. Do not open the door in the first 15 minutes.
- Cook the flour outThe tablespoon of flour slaked in cold milk and stirred into boiling milk is a panada. Keep it over gentle heat, stirring, for two or three minutes after it thickens — undercooked flour gives the finished soufflé a pasty taste that no amount of vanilla hides.
- Yolks go in warm, not hotYolks go in cool, not hot -- "When nearly cold" matters: stirred into a boiling base the yolks scramble and you lose the smooth texture. The recipe's own direction is to let the base cool almost completely first.
- Fold, do not stir brisklyThis is the hinge. Loosen the base with a spoonful of the whites, then cut and fold the rest in with a spatula in as few strokes as will just combine them. Beaten \"briskly\" in the modern sense the air goes and the soufflé stays flat.
- The hot buttered dishHeating the greased tin before the batter goes in gives the mixture an immediate lift at the sides. Butter it well and, if you like, dust with caster sugar for a crisper crust. Half-full is genuinely the limit.
- The jam layerSpread it thin and choose a stiff preserve; a loose jam turns to syrup and soaks the base. It will end up as a dark stratum under the risen batter rather than a distinct layer.
- ServingTwenty-five minutes at 350°F is about right for a dish of this size; it should be firm at the centre when a knife is slipped in. The instruction to serve with the utmost expedition is not rhetoric — the fall begins within two or three minutes of leaving the oven. Serves four or five as written.
The word itself is simply the French past participle of souffler, to blow or puff, and the dish is generally traced to early nineteenth-century French practice, Antonin Carooks cookery books as ovens grew reliable enough to hold a steady heat. The costing -- tenpence for a pudding for five -- is characteristic of Victorian household manuals, which priced every dish so a mistress could check her cook's accounts; it also shows how a fashionable French sweet had been brought within reach of an ordinary middle-class table using little more than milk, flour and three eggs.