Broccoli soufflé

Tonight it was a tossup between this savory broccoli or a chocolate soufflé. I still might do the chocolate one because now the idea won't go away. 

It is a meringue that carries a sauce made with the yolks and sometimes little particles, sometimes cheese. 

Five eggs can lift a cup of sauce. One more egg white than egg yolk. So five egg whites,  then the four egg yolks included with the sauce. 

It's considered difficult but I don't know why. Possibly because there are three spots that take a special cheffery type of specialized mixing.

* First a portion the hot sauce is mixed into the room temperature egg yolk to temper the yolks to the temperature of the hot sauce without curdling the yolks

* and then a portion of beaten egg whites is mixed into that sauce that is fortified with egg yolk to lighten it and bring its saucy texture closer to the fluffy meringue

* then the lightened sauce is folded into the meringue carefully to not lose its air. 

Is that so hard?

The chill is taken off the eggs. If you live in Europe you're probably wondering, who puts eggs in the refrigerator? 

We do. 

As always, the spices are heated in fat, this time butter, this time with flour for a roux. 

When I make a sauce with a roux, it will always take some kind of wine. The butter and wine are like a sauce by themselves. Recipes call for all kinds of powders, like garlic powder or cayenne, but this time I'm going light, just mustard this time. 

A portion of the sauce above is combined with the egg yolks in a separate bowl not shown, then recombined back into the pot with the bulk of the sauce. The sauce contains the broccoli bits but no cheese. There is ample cheese spread all around the inside of the  baking dish to give the expanding meringue a textured surface to climb up. Plus the baked cheese is delicious. 

This soufflé rose considerably above the rim of the baking dish then collapsed while it baked. Then collapsed more back to this level by the time it brought to the table. 

When eggs cook too long they squeeze out their liquid portion. This was removed from the oven right as that was happening. Nonetheless, although not tall, it is everything I wanted in flavored foamy eggs. 

Lox and Parmigiano soufflé

Traditionally cheese does not go with fish. That is a rule people live by. Why? The best reasoning I've heard has to do with a deep appreciation for fresh ingredients. Fish is such an ingredient that is best intensely fresh. Fresh fresh fresh. Like one minute out of the water is best, and everything after that is worse worse worse.

Cheese is the opposite of that, even the best cheese is usually a case of aging and it is a carefully processed  food. Another area for pride, yes, but not with fish. 

Lox is salmon that is processed and somewhat aged when compared to seafood that is rushed from the water to the kitchen with as little intervening time and handling as possible.   

A dish is prepared with butter and some of that fantastic grated cheese. This coating is a big part of the result. It gives the whipped egg a rough wall to crawl up as the air bubbles inside the foam expand by heat, and it produces a cheese crust that is very appealing. It's always the first thing I go for. 

This was a meal for one person. I am not sharing with anybody. 

* Four jumbo eggs are separated, whites into a large bowl that is not plastic and the egg yolks into a small pot. The elements for about 3/4 cup sauce go directly into the pot, 

* butter

* milk 

* teaspoon flour along with a few flavors, 

* mustard powder,

* salt and pepper and then whisked until boiling then removed from the heat. 

The egg whites are whipped with cream of tartar powder. The sauce is folded into egg whites and the layered with lox and shavings of Parmigiano Reggiano. 

The sauce sinks to the bottom. Using a rubber spatula or a broad spoon, the sauce is lifted up through egg white foam and released. That lifting and spreading movement is repeated a few times until the two are combined.

A portion of the egg white foam can be mixed into the sauce first to bring the texture of the sauce closer to the texture of the foam but I skipped doing that that here. So the mustard flavored sauce sank immediately to the bottom, mostly out of sight. Sauce and foam are combined incompletely to protect the foam. They are not whipped together.