The Hospitality Guru | Canberra blog on great food, wine, cooking and the hospitality industry.

Have you ever woken up late with a craving for chocolate cake? Not just any chocolate cake either….. but a delicious, soft, delicate puff of chocolatey goodness that melts in your mouth kinda cake. For some reason The MasterChef Australia Volume Two Cookbook has been sitting on our kitchen bench open to ‘Carrie’s Chocolate & Raspberry Soufflés with Lavender Cream‘ for days now.  It’s been taunting me, begging me to have a crack at making it.

I’ve always been able to whip up a soufflé without a worry, & my need to consume chocolate cake for a late Brunch was nagging at me, so I didn’t really stop to think about the recipe itself. I did briefly wonder if there was any reason why the cookbook suggested a 250ml ramekin, but you know what it’s like when you’ve got a one track mind & chocolate is the reward, you just let it be a passing thought right? You see I wanted to bake a giant soufflé.  Why?  Well why not right, I’d done it before & it worked a treat. So the pressure was on & I carried on regardless substituting strawberries for blackberries as I liked them better.

I pulled out my giant 500-ml ramekins & got stuck into it. When it comes to a soufflé, it’s always best to just stick to the recipe, but in this case it was a little difficult to follow & maybe I was a little over confident, but the deeper I got into this recipe I thought the methodology had been written a bit awkwardly, in fact quite a lot of the recipes don’t seem to flow so well in this cookbook at all.  Has anyone else found that?

Chocolate & Strawberry Souffle with Lavender Cream

60g unsalted butter, chopped

200g dark chocolate, chopped

1 punnet (125g) strawberries

3 egg yolks

6 egg whites

80g caster sugar

300ml pouring cream

1tbs caster sugar

1 tsp dried lavender, chopped

Grease six 1-cup (250ml) ovenproof ramekins with melted butter and sprinkle with caster sugar to coat the base and side. Shake out the excess sugar.

Ensure the butter is rubbed vertically into the moulds, this usually will help the soufflés to grow extra tall.

Fill a small saucepan one-third full with water and bring to a gentle simmer. Place the butter and chocolate in a small heatproof bowl, place over the pan and stir until melted (don’t let the bowl touch the water). When the chocolate mixture has melted remove from heat and set aside.

Blend the strawberries in a food processor and blend to a smooth puree, then pass through a fine sieve, pressing with the back of a spoon to remove the seeds. Discard seeds.

Combine the egg and strawberry mixture and add to the melted chocolate, I love this part when the colours all come together, looks pretty right?

Yummmmm…. Strawberry Chocolatey goodness.  Absolutely necessary at this stage to dip little finger into mixture (once only OK) & taste – that’s just to keep you going till later. Do not miss this step!  Good huh?

Using an electric mixer or your trusty Kenwood Chef, whisk your egg whites into submission, whisking whites to stiff peaks, then gradually add sugar, a thick glossy meringue is what your aiming for.

Now., this is the bit where you can easily go wrong, gently stir one-third of the meringue into the chocolate mixture to loosen the thick chocolate sauce, this make the chocolate mixture not so dense & a little easier to gently fold the rest in.

Add the remaining meringue, folding ever so gently until its fully incorporated with no white streaks, taking care not to lose volume.

Divide the mixture evenly among the ramekins without spilling onto the rim of the dish (or soufflés will stick to rim and not rise evenly). Place on an oven tray and bake for 18 minutes or until well risen.

Serve immediately with the cream.  While I could not fault the taste of this recipe, it seemed to me to be chocolate heavy & didn’t rise to the heady heights I’m used to; next time I’d definatly go back to my tried & trusted never fail soufflé recipe.  But, it totally satisfied my chocolate craving & yes, I ate it all by myself – all 500 ml of it, cos that’s the sort of gal I am!

---