My Very First Soufflé

So I made my first soufflé. 
It was a little too brown on top but overall I am pretty chuffed with the result. I mean, they actually rose!
It was a savoury soufflé with chedder, spinach and spring garlic. 
Spring garlic, you ask? You have never heard of spring garlic? Well, gather around and let me tell you all about this amazing vegetable and how I came to hold some in my hot little hand.
For those following, you may remember that I am in the process of cultivating my own crop of garlic, and in a moment of impatience I called my garlic guru aunt "J" to find out if I can pick it now. "Well, you could, she said, but it would be spring garlic which is very nice... but you have to wait until December to have the fully grown garlic bulbs."
Sigh. December is ages away. I am over the imported garlic that the shops are trying to flog to me and yet I am not prepared to give up one of my 5 garlic plants to try this Spring Garlic. It looked like I would have to be patient.
That is until I went to J's house in Orange the other weekend. She has about 30 garlic plants just growing away there. I had garlic envy. 

J, being the lovely aunt that she is, gifted me with 3 bulbs of spring garlic so that I could try it without breaking into my stash. She also gave me a dozen freshly laid eggs from her chickens to take back to Sydney.
Spring garlic, also known as green garlic, is when the plant has formed a bulb but has yet to seperate into cloves or develop a papery skin. Often gardeners will harvest spring garlic as a way of thinning out the crop which allows for the larger garlic to reach its full size. Apparently these sweet little bulbs are known as a gardener's treat. I can see why. The flavour is still unmistakenly garlic, but subtle and sweet. You would treat it the same way as you would a leek or a spring onion.  

So as I was learning about Spring garlic, the good people over at Delicious Magazine had published a recipe in this month's issue using this vegetable in a soufflé. I had Spring Garlic and I had fresh eggs; it was a no brainer. 

Actually it was a little more stressful than that. All I had ever heard about soufflés is that they are hard. Hard work and hard to make rise. After sitting there for a couple of hours, biting my nails and staring blankly at the recipe and then staring blankly at the eggs, I realised that it was time to get to it and make this thing.  If worse came to worse, I would start over and sacrifice one of my plants.

But I didn't have to. I had the stove on the wrong setting and over-cooked the tops, but I got there in the nick of time to sort that out and they still rose. I was able to taste the beautiful spring garlic, and I reckon that it tasted even better because it was in my first soufflé!

The below recipe calls for 1 large 6 cup ramekin, which I did not have. Instead I used 4, 1 1/2 cup (approx) ramekins and had leftovers which was a shame. As for the chopping of the baby spinach, do yourself a massive favour and throw this in the food processor to chop. You don't need to be worrying yourself with shredding up leaves when you have egg whites to deal with later. Serve and eat immediately, unless you need to photograph them. If you choose to do this, hurry! You are losing precious millimetres from your soufflé!



Spring Garlic Soufflé
Directly made from a recipe by Matthew Evans in the October 2011 issue of Delicious Magazine.


350ml Milk
1 bay leaf
100g unsalted butter
1 large spring garlic, outer leaves removed and bulb and some of stem finely sliced. Can be substituted for 2 cloves of ordinary garlic.
100g baby spinach, finely chopped
50g plain flour
100g finely grated cheddar
25g dried breadcrumbs
6 eggs separated plus 2 extra egg yolks
salt and pepper to taste

1. Pour the milk into a saucepan with the bay leaf and heat until just before boiling point. Take care the milk does not catch on the bottom. Take off the heat and set aside to infuse for around 20 minutes.
2. in a heavy bottomed pan, melt 20g of the butter over a low heat and add the garlic. Stir until soft (about 5 min) and then increase the heat to medium, add the spinach and stir for about 3 minutes to soften. Add 50g of the butter and stir until melted.
3.  Turn the heat to low and add the flour and stir to combine for a minute. It will look like a green paste. Just keep stirring.
4. Very slowly, pour in the milk, taking care to stir out any lumps. Keep pouring until all combined (3 or 4 minutes) and it is smooth and bubbling.
5. Add the cheese, stir to combine and set aside and cool
6. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius
7. Brush your ramekin (or ramekins) with the remaining melted butter and lightly dust the insides with the breadcrumbs
8. Lightly whisk the egg yolks and add to the spinach and garlic mixture. Mix well and season with salt and pepper
9. In a metal or glass bowl, whisk the egg whites until you have stiff peaks and then with a large metal spoon, gradually fold the whites into the garlic and spinach mix. Do not over mix, use a cutting and folding motion with the spoon.
10. Tip the mix into your ramekin/s and place on the middle rack of the oven. 
11. Bake for 40-45 minutes. Serve and eat immediately.