C is for CHEESE SOUFFLÉ
by Brigitte Raskin
Favourite dish
Literary tear-off calendar, 21/22-5-2005
It was the family’s favourite dish and only Aunt Tata could make it: cheese soufflé, not in an ovenproof dish in the oven, but in a closed iron mould au bain-marie. Because Tata used an ordinary cooking pot and the rising water bubbles – just below boiling point, not quite bubbles yet – could make the mould capsize, she placed a clean brick on top of it that she kept among her kitchen utensils especially for that purpose.
The construction bubbled away on the stove for half an hour. Then, after opening and turning over the mould, there slid le moment suprême – a light cheese pastry onto the dish. Tata poured a thin cheese sauce full of shrimps over it and cut it with a knife into festive slices.
Our ‘tata’, the eldest sister of our dad, Maria Raskin, a schoolteacher who remained unmarried all her life (Stevoort, 1896 – Aarschot, 1971). When our mum died (1959), tata came to live with us, until our dad remarried. Tata did not let the soufflé rise in the oven in a classic soufflé dish (a large ramekin), but in a bain-marie in a closed iron Bundt tin (see the accompanying photo, but our tin had no grooves).
I inherited Tata’s closed mould and her recipe booklet, in which the cheese roux does go in an ovenproof dish in the oven and its composition holds no secrets (butter, flour, milk, eggs, cheese, pepper and salt, it cannot get any simpler, more rustic or more old-fashioned in culinary terms).
Since that precious inheritance I have tried to do it Tata’s way, brick at the ready. But every time I turn out the mould, the roux slumps together on the dish, with only in the middle a hint of how it should have been. Serve with white wine.
preparation for six people
- Separate six eggs. Grease the Bundt tin with butter. Sprinkle the walls of the buttered tin with grated Parmesan. This fixes the mixture better and it will rise better than if you use only butter.
- Melt 100 g butter in a medium pan over moderate heat. Add 80 g flour while whisking constantly. Cook for about 2 minutes until you have a smooth, blond roux.
- Add 1/2 l semi-skimmed milk while whisking and season with pepper, salt and nutmeg. Simmer for 3 minutes, stirring, until thick and smooth. Whisk often over the bottom and side of the pan. Take the pan off the heat and let it cool briefly.
- Then stir in the egg yolks and 200 g finely grated Gruyère cheese.
- Beat the egg whites with a pinch of salt until stiff, but do not overdo it: egg white beaten too stiff ‘breaks’ when you mix it into a sauce. Using a supple spatula or wooden spoon, fold 2/3 of the beaten egg white into the cheese sauce with slow, careful movements, and then the rest of the egg white. The cheese sauce must no longer be too hot when you add the egg whites.
- Spoon into the soufflé dish.
- Put water in a large pot and heat it to just below boiling point, place the Bundt tin with its lid in it and put a brick on top.
- Leave to bubble for half an hour au bain-marie.
- Open the lid and turn the mould out onto a dish.
- Pour a thin cheese sauce full of shrimps over it.