Robuchon’s Chocolate Soufflé

recipe hero image
4
Prep 15 mins
Cook 16 mins

Ingredients

Softened butter, as needed
120 g granulated sugar, plus more for ramekins
150 g dark chocolate
300 g egg whites
1.5 g cream of tartar (optional, about 1/8 tsp)

Steps

1
Preheat oven: Heat oven to 375 °F (190 °C) with the convection fan off.
2
Prep ramekins: Generously butter four 6-ounce (180ml) ramekins, brushing with vertical brush strokes to help with the rise. Add a generous amount of sugar to one ramekin, tapping and rotating the ramekin while pouring the sugar into the next ramekin as you go. Be sure to thoroughly coat the sides and lip of the ramekin with sugar.
3
Melt chocolate: Place chocolate in a shallow bowl; set the bowl over a pot filled with a small amount of simmering water to steam the bowl. Let melt, stirring, until smooth.
4
Make Swiss meringue: Add eggs, sugar, and cream of tartar to the bowl of a stand mixer. Set this into the steaming pot of water used for the chocolate and whisk the mixture until it reaches 130 °F (54 °C). (The egg whites should be partly whipped by this point.) Switch to the stand-mixer and finish whipping on high speed until reaching soft peaks.
5
Fold meringue into chocolate: Add half of meringue to chocolate and fold to combine. Fold in remaining meringue. Add to ramekins until just shy of the top. Knock on counter to level the surface.
6
Bake & serve: Bake for 16 minutes and serve immediately.

Notes

Soufflés can be prepared and frozen before baking. To bake from frozen, reduce oven temperature to 300 °F (190 °C) and bake for 32 minutes. They will lose about 30% of the height of a fresh soufflé and will not be as perfectly shaped, but they will still be very good. Technical Notes Swiss meringue = better soufflé: By heating egg whites and sugar to 130 °F (54 °C), the proteins are unwound just enough to whip into a more stable meringue that supports taller soufflés without the need for added starch. Cream of tartar is extra insurance: Adding 0.5% of the weight of egg whites in cream of tartar to the whites makes them much less prone to overwhipping — think of it as insurance for your soufflé. Cocoa butter bullying: Cocoa butter will knock stabilizing proteins off the meringue’s air bubbles. But as the chocolate cools during folding, the cocoa butter solidifies so that it's less destructive during the second addition of meringue.