Chef Jacques Pepin was a good friend of Julia Childs and, as it turns out, he's got some cooking videos out on YouTube. Oh, wait, everyone seems to have posted something on YouTube, right? The video I came across was of Chef Pepin making a cheese souffle' the way his mother did. It really appealed to me because it was a much easier method than the traditional French method which require beating egg whites into a stiff meringue before being added to the souffle's egg mixture. If you want to make this, do a simple search on YouTube for Pepin and souffle and you'll find it. For now, here's a quick summary of how it turned out for me!
Here's how simple it is -- beat a bunch of eggs and mix in bechamel sauce. That's it, pretty simple, eh? About six tablespoons of butter was melted and mixed with six tablespoons of flour. These were cooked together for a couple of minutes to make the traditional roux. About 2 cups of boiling milk was mixed in with the roux to make a fairly thick bechamel sauce.
Eggs, lots of eggs! Six extra large eggs were beat together (no separated) and to that the bechamel sauce was stirred in. A cup of grated Swiss cheese and chopped green onions were mixed in and then the mixture was ready!
I decided to cook this in two different types of pans -- some of the mixture went into ramekins to make individual souffle's while the rest went into a cast iron pan. Both the ramekins and the cast iron pan were lightly buttered and then a layer of grated Parmesan coated the inside of the pans. I just sprinkled in the grated cheese and shook the pan around to leave an even coating on the bottom and along the sides. This cheese is what will make a nice crusty layer when the souffle is baked.
The mixture was poured into the pans to fill them a little over halfway and they went into the oven at 375 degrees for about 35 minutes until the tops began to brown just a bit.
My souffles raised up about half the original height but they certainly didn't puff way up as far as a traditional souffle. They actually came out with about the same texture as a quiche but they sure were tasty. I'll still be trying to make one of these things nice and poofy by using egg whites that are beaten into a stiff meringue but, I have to be honest, this method was so darn easy it'll probably be one of my favorite ways of making a souffle.
One of the best parts of this recipe (and the individual ramekins) was the leftovers! The leftovers were awesom both cold as well as when reheated. I didn't have much to write because this was soooooooo simple. Thanks to Chef Pepin and YouTube!!
Bon Appetit!
Commentaires