Simply Baking – souffles (with that Nutter twist)

Today is souffle day, and not – as indicated by the Foxtel guide – omelette day. This is a great relief to me, not because I don’t adore omelettes (I am human, after all), but because I was struggling to understand how – even with a Nutter twist – an omelette could fall under the heading “baking”. Now I need worry no more! It’s souffle (with a Nutter twist). Two, in fact: one sweet and one savoury.

It is an orange shirt day again today, which I believe bodes well. The reason I say this is that we’ve now seen the orange shirt three times, if my memory is correct, so a revival of the flames can’t be too far away.

We’re starting with the savoury: the classic cheese souffle. Don’t be put off by the reputation of cheese souffle as a difficult dish – the Nutter tips’n'tricks will help us through!

The recipes, after the jump.

Cheese Souffle

We’re starting with a hot tip right out of the gate: get all your bits’n'pieces ready before you start “and you should have no problem at all”.

For four small souffles.

25g melted butter
2 tbsp Freshly grated parmesan (NOT Perfect Italiano, please!)

Roux
25g butter
2 tbspns plain flour
200ml warm milk

Souffle
4 eggs
Bunch of chives, chopped finely
Handful of parsley, chopped finely
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
75g Cheddar cheese, grated (you can also use Stilton or Roquefort, but be careful with the fat content of the Roquefort as it will melt differently)

Dressing
1 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp water
1 egg yolk
1 tbsp mustard
1/2 tbsp white wine vinegar
1/2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper

Salad leaves to serve

Preheat oven to 180, with a tray inside, for about half an hour.

Brush the sides of the ramekins with the melted butter. Pop a bit of the parmesan in the bottom of each dish and shake it around the bottom and then shake it around over another dish. You’re aiming for an even coating of parmesan all the way around the dish.

At this point you can digress, trying to explain exactly what a cheese souffle is. Don’t worry if your explanation is confusing – or downright contradictory – we’ve all been there. “Think of a cheese sauce, but a really thick cheese sauce, but light and fluffy”.

Melt the butter in a pan for the roux, then add the flour. Stir for about a minute to cook out the starch in order to avoid your souffle being “gaggy” in the mouth. Stir in the milk, bit by bit, until you have a smooth mixture. Remove the pan from the heat if you need to, so that it doesn’t stick. Pour the mixture into a bowl to cool slightly.

Take your room temperature eggs – oh, didn’t I mention that earlier? They should be at room temperature, as cold egg whites don’t fluff up very well. Separate the eggs and make sure you don’t get any grease into the egg whites. That will reduce their fluffiness too. Add the chives and parsley to the egg yolks and season. Add the cheese and mix in, and then mix vigorously into your roux with a wooden spoon. Express surprise that it actually smells nice. You can add some chopped red chillies for an extra kick, although this is not the patented Nutter twist.

Grab your egg whites and whisk until nice and floofy – stop before you get to the over-your-head point. While you’re whisking, heat a tablespoon of sugar and a tablespoon of water in a pan until it’s at a slow boil. This is for the sweet dressing, which sounds a bit dodgy to me.

Take two tablespoons of the egg whites and beat them into the cheese mix. Don’t worry about losing the air from the whites, as this is just to loosen up the cheese mix. Once you’ve done that, you’re ready for the careful folding stage. Pour the egg whites in and gently fold with a spatula. Remember that this is a last minute dish – none of that “baking the day before” game here.

Carefully spoon the mix into the ramekin dishes to about three quarters full. Sprinkle a touch of paprika over the top, with some cheese that you have apparently reserved for this purpose. Huh? Pull out your heated tray, pop the ramekins on top, and slide them into the oven for about ten minutes. In case this is the absolute first time you’ve ever heard of souffles, you might want to note that you shouldn’t open the oven door, or bang them about.

While the souffles are baking, you can complete the sweet dressing, or you can give that a miss and have a cup of tea. I know which one I’d be doing. If you are committed to doing the dressing, mix your egg yolk with the mustard, and then add the sugar syrup you’ve prepared earlier, whisking as you add. (If, perchance, you are preparing this without having read ahead, and you’ve made the syrup but have decided to make a cup of tea instead of the dressing, don’t fret. I know waste is wrong, but it’s a tablespoon of sugar and one of water. A small price to pay for a cuppa.) Add the vinegar and olive oil and you will have a nice “sweet and sour dressing”, which actually sounds better than the “sweet dressing” Nutter was talking about earlier. Go on, then, make the dressing and have a glass of wine with your souffle. Season to taste.

Scatter some leaves around a plate and drizzle with what is now being called a vinaigrette. Really, it would have been better if he’d called it that from the start, and indicated that it was for salad.

Once the time is up, remove your lovely – sorry, ultimate, or even “perfect” – souffles from the oven and pop onto the salad plates. Serve immediately.

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The Ultimate Omelette Souffle

Okay, now I see how the guide got that… wrong-ish.  It’s scented with orange, so we’ve also got our shirt match for the day.

The Souffomelette

3 eggs, separated (and, I’m guessing, at room temperature)
2 tsp vanilla essence
25g caster sugar
zest of 1 orange
25g butter

Fruit sauce

Any fruit you have lying around
A knob of butter
1 tbspn rum
1 clove
2 tbspns cream
caster sugar

Whisk the egg whites until they are light and fluffy. Make sure you run the beater against the sides of your bowl, so that it’s impossible to be heard over the sound. Keep talking, anyway, but make sure it’s irrelevant babble so that it doesn’t interfere – too much – with the accuracy of the recipe. Add the vanilla essence and then the caster sugar, bit by bit. Stop when the egg whites are about double in size.

Grab your bowl of egg yolks. Grate some orange zest – not the whole orange, just a few “stripes” into the yolks and mix a little. While you’re doing this, reminisce about how much you used to hate omelettes until your mum cooked them this way (which is to say, as a souffle, right?). Loosen up the yolk mixture with a little of the egg whites, mixing thoroughly, and then pour that over the egg whites. Heat up the frying pan with the butter (and take this opportunity, I guess, to preheat your grill to a high heat) and then fold in the egg mixtures.

Stick well clear of this dish if you’re having a dinner party, not because it’s nasty, but because you can’t make many of them at once.

Pour your souffomelette mix into the hot pan and cook until the bottom is sealed. Once it is, pop the pan under the grill to finish cooking.

For the sauce, wazz in a banana (no, it’s not rude, it’s a Nutterism for… I’m not exactly sure what. Just as he started to explain, he went off on a tangent about putting a glossary of Nutterisms on the Carlton Food Network website, which clearly did not happen, as I have googled the Nutter exhaustively). Judging from what is happening on screen, “wazz” just means “cut up”. Melt the butter in a pan and toss in the wazzed banana. Add the rum and the clove (for that Christmassy feel) and then add a touch of cream. Throw in whatever fruit you’ve selected – Nutter has gone with raspberries and strawberries – and the sugar.

Check on your souffomelette – it should have risen nicely and have gone a golden brown colour. Fold the souffomelette over and lift it out of the pan onto a pretty plate. Remove the clove from the orgasmic sauce and pour it around the sides of the plate. Hopefully you, too, will have some fruit coulis lying around so that you can pour it over the top, and finish by dusting with icing sugar.