Week 35: Chocolate Soufflé

Chocolate Soufflé

It shouldn’t be difficult to know who put this item on our list. It’s chocolate and there is no crust or fruit…that would mean Aubrey!!

I have never eaten a soufflé and, obviously, never made one. I remember TV shows as a kid always showing soufflés being difficult to make and that they would collapse at the slightest bump. We were going to find out how temperamental they are or aren’t and why they would be considered difficult to make.

This week’s recipe came from our Cook’s Illustrated Baking cook book, again. We used a couple substitutions for this recipe. We used some Lily’s sugar free semi-sweet chocolate chips for the chocolate. Since none of us are fans of orange chocolate, we substituted Kahlua for the Grand Marnier.

Ingredients

• 5 tablespoons unsalted butter (1 tablespoon softened, remaining butter cut into 1/4-inch chunks)
• 1 tablespoon granulated sugar, plus 1/3 cup
• 8 ounces bittersweet chocolate or semi-sweet chocolate, chopped coarse
• ⅛ teaspoon table salt
• ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 tablespoon orange liqueur, preferably Grand Marnier
• 6 large egg yolks
• 8 large egg whites
• ¼ teaspoon cream of tartar

Instructions

1. Before you Begin: Rather than one large soufflé, you can make individual ones. To do so, completely fill eight 8-ounce ramekins with the chocolate mixture, making sure to clean each rim with a wet paper towel and reduce baking time to sixteen to eighteen minutes. For a mocha-flavored soufflé, add one tablespoon of instant coffee powder dissolved in one tablespoon of hot water when adding the vanilla to the chocolate mixture. If you are microwave oriented, melt the chocolate at 50 percent power for three minutes, stirring in the butter after two minutes.
2. Adjust oven rack to lower middle position and heat oven to 375 degrees. Butter inside of 2-quart soufflé dish with the 1 tablespoon softened butter, then coat inside of dish evenly with the 1 tablespoon sugar; refrigerate until ready to use.
3. Melt chocolate and remaining butter in medium bowl set over pan of simmering water. Turn off heat, stir in salt, vanilla, and liqueur; set aside.
4. In medium bowl, beat yolks and remaining sugar with electric mixer set on medium speed until thick and pale yellow, about 3 minutes. Fold into chocolate mixture. Clean beaters.
5. In medium bowl, beat whites with electric mixer set on medium speed until foamy. Add cream of tartar and continue to beat on high speed to stiff, moist peaks. (Mixture should just hold the weight of a raw egg in the shell when the egg is placed on top.)
6. Vigorously stir one-quarter of whipped whites into chocolate mixture. Following illustrations below, gently fold remaining whites into mixture until just incorporated. Spoon mixture into prepared dish; bake until exterior is set but interior is still a bit loose and creamy, about 25 minutes. (Soufflé is done when fragrant and fully risen. Use two large spoons to pull open the top and peek inside. If not yet done, place back in oven.) Serve immediately.

Our Experience

This weekend was a busy one and we barely had time to get these done! When we are rushed, it’s the pictures that suffer, so, our apologies!

We usually melt our chocolate in the microwave and today, with our time constraints, was no time to change our methods.

While Aubrey melted the chocolate, I got the ramekins out again. We were faced with a recipe that called for 8 again, so we had to use our extra red ones again.

With the chocolate and butter melted together, the next step seemed sketchy to us, but with a lot of hesitation, Aubrey went ahead and added the liquor, vanilla, and salt. Why the hesitation?? Well, because if you add water to melted chocolate, it can seize up and stiffen up never to be a smooth melty chocolate again!! Was she justified in her hesitation? YES!!! The chocolate seized up and was worthless. Did I mention we were working late into the night on this one and didn’t have time to waste? Luckily, we had some of the Lily’s dark chocolate semi-sweet morsels on hand otherwise, the soufflé would have been over before it got started! On our second attempt we added the liquor and vanilla to the eggs instead of the chocolate.

While Aubrey worked on the second batch of chocolate, I beat the egg whites. By the way, did I also mention we only had 6 eggs? (Really poorly planned today, I guess.) I had to get some of our extra egg whites from previous bakes out of the freezer and thaw them. Once again, luckily we had frozen them in portions of two.

Aubrey had the chore of folding the egg whites into the chocolate, which, she was certain was seizing up again when she added the egg mixture. I just told her to go fast!! She managed to get them incorporated along with the first bit of egg whites before the chocolate could stiffen up. Whew!! The rest of the egg whites were added slowly and carefully.

We weren’t sure if we should tap them to smooth the tops so we didn’t. After baking them, we found a recipe that said to fill them to the top, level them off with a knife, and then clean the sides. Doing that would produce the iconic flat top that a soufflé is supposed to have. Some of ours ended up with a flat top and others were a little rounded. Not a big deal for us. We took them out when they didn’t “jiggle” any longer and there was no raw part in the middle.

They all raised up nicely and we were wondering how easily they might fall. For us, it wasn’t the bumping or movement of them that caused them to fall, but time. They slowly sunk as time went by. That’s probably one reason why they should be served almost immediately.

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What we liked.

These were a resounding 5 out of 5. The chocolate lovers were sold on them. Personally, I love dark chocolate and I think using the dark chocolate chips was providential. We couldn’t taste any of the Kahlua, which is exactly what we were hoping for.

The texture of a soufflé is difficult to describe. It is light and fluffy, and would melt in your mouth yet had substance enough that you could chew it. The center of ours wasn’t set and I’m not sure it is supposed to be but that part was really good too. It was almost like it had a sauce.

I can see why these are served in “fancy” restaurants. They are simple enough to make but look difficult and are really unique. They are not only texturally light but light as in not filling. I could have easily eaten 3 or 4 without them being too sweet or weighing me down. (I didn’t, but could have!) 😉

What we would change.

We did change how the liquor and vanilla were added. I was surprised that the cook book had us add them to the chocolate in the first place.

I read on another post that these could be made ahead of time and then baked right before serving them, and that might be worth trying. We could bake half one day and the other half the next day so they would always be fresh out of the oven.

I would also like to see what a different liquor would add to them such as cinnamon or raspberry.

What we learned.

We learned that cook books aren’t infallible and, sometimes, as long as it doesn’t change the outcome, it is OK to change the recipe when you have concerns about the directions as written. (I learned that I need to have Aubrey write the grocery list because I don’t actually OPEN the egg carton to count the eggs. What? We had eggs, just not 8.)

Until next week, Happy Baking!