Souffles

Ingredients

• Potato-starch
• flavoured with vanilla
• flavoured with ginger
• wheat-flour, plain or with sour cream
• rice-grits or ground rice
• with almonds
• with chocolate
• with raisins
• with currants

Method

1. 1

   For baking a souffle, use a moderately hot oven.

2. 2

   Place the batter in a well-buttered tin, surrounded by buttered paper that rises above the batter.

3. 3

   Bake immediately and ensure the souffle is served hot to prevent collapsing.

As published

This recipe was extracted from The spirit of cookery (1895) by Johann Ludwig Wilhelm Thudichum, page 246. The excerpt below is the record exactly as published.

Souffles must be light, porous, spongy like froth ; as their rising is entirely due to the evolution of 390 THE SPIRIT OF COOKERY steam, they must be brought to the table hot, in the in- flated condition, before they have time to collapse.* As the starch or Hour, by the aid of which they are made, contributes little to the specificity of the souffles, they should Ije named either after the flavouring and characteristically prevailing ingredient only, or both the floury base and the flavouring should be named. B.g., a chocolate souffle made with rice-flour should be distinguished from that made with potato-flour, as they taste somewhat differently. The, kinds of flour useful for souffles are wheat- flotor, groimd rice, IMtato-starch, arroioroot starch, tainoca swelled starch, totis- les-mois, and rough ground Italian paste, called semolina. The flavourimj may be orange, lemon, orange-flowers, cinna- mon, vanilla, ginger, chocolate, coffee, or any kind of essence or liqueur. Th.e.fruit-ja7ns to be mixed or given with them may be apricots, peaches, nectarines, and all kinds of plums. Of fruit, raspberries, currants, strawberries, gooseberries, apples, and pineapples have been put in souffles, but their addition not only compromises their success, but appears to us to destroy their character. Such additions of fruit and acid flavours, if desired at all, had better be made in the shape of sauce. A comparison of sotoflles with other preparations con- taining the same ingredients is not without philosophical interest. Thus, pancakes are batter fried in a raw state, the frying being their only and final coction, while souffles are first cooked and then baked. The former admit of the introduction into their body of fruit in substance, such as apples, but then receive a new name, that ol fritters ; the apples taking the lead, and the batter acting only as a sub- * We have collected many excellent recipes for souffles, the best being contained in old family records. For all souffles, cf. Careme, ‘Pat. Roy. Paris,’ vol. i., pp. 349 to 365, where the difficulties attending souffle .are well described. He advises souffles to be made broad, and not high— 12 inches by 3 or 4 inches high. He .also terms every souffle Frau{'aii. Id., ibid., vol. ii., pp. 169, 317 (‘Petits Souffles ’). SOUFhLES AND PANCAKES 391 ordinate covering to them. The philosophy of pancakes is not easily written, but deserves more attention than is given to it. The most elementary pancake, for example, is Schmarn, which is the staple food during the entire winter and part of the summer of the highlanders of Bavaria and Austria. The batter is made with water and salt, and fried in lard. Every addition may improve it, but it is remark- able how well this simple form tastes when well made, and how much more attractive and digestible it is than stale bread would be under the same circumstances. Pancakes admit of the introduction of vegetable pulps in several forms. Thus, grated ijotatoas, even without a portion of the starch which is deposited when they are grated raw, mixed with batter and fried, form a very characteristic dish. The analogue of this grated-potato pancake amongst the dumplings is the glitscher, or slider, so called by the High Germans on account of the lubricated ease with which it is swallowed. For the baking of a souffle the oven should be moderately hot, so that the dish gets done slowly ; the batter may be put into any shape of earthenware or porcelain, but it is best to place it in a form of tin, which can be opened at the side in case it were desirable to remove the shape, and serve the souffle free. Most souffles should be baked imme- diately on, and surrounded by, buttered, larded, or oiled paper, and the lateral upright paper should rise much above the level of the batter, so that in rising the souffle may be contained and not overflow. The form should be well buttered under all circumstances, so that neither the batter nor the paper has any chance of adhering either to the tin or the paper. To prevent the souffle from collapsing pre- maturely, it should be placed in its shape upon another baking-sheet and surrounded with hot embers, covered with a warmed dish-cover, and thus carried to the door of the 392 THE SPIRIT OP COOKERY dining-room. Well-made, fine-grained soufiles do not easily collapse, but such as have been badly made and overheated soon lose their intended appearance. Souffles may be produced with the following principal ingredients : Potato-starch flavoured loith vanilla, or with ginger, or gnneajjjjle, agnicot, rasgjberry ; luheal-fluur, plain or with sour cream, flavoured With imncli ; ivkeat-grits, plain or with almonds, chocolate, raisins and currants ; rice-grits or ground rice and lohole rice are used for the same kinds of souffles; grits import an agreeable granular body to them ; souffles of nouilles, potatoes, brown bread, with several variations, close the list of souffles in which flour is used. A series of preparations which contain no farinaceous matter, and are perhaps improperly termed souffles, but are accepted under that name, are the following : They may be made with apiples ; or apples, biscuits, 7nacroons ; or with almonds, white or roasted ; of meringue piaste flavoured with orange

Cook this with the app: pantry check, scaling, and the assistant.