Emeril's Chocolate Souffle

Though I had proclaimed my disinterest in post-holiday desserts...for some reason I decided to make one from scratch just three days after returning to San Francisco. Originally I had thought of doing molten lava cakes as they are supposed to be quite easy (surprisingly, I have never before made one). However, I then remembered I had been wanted to make souffles and considered them the healthier alternative. After making the souffles, I realized that they were likely no better for you than molten lava cakes are...but oh well! The individual servings mean that you don't have additional servings laying around the house to be each night after night - so you indulge one time, enjoy it, and it's done!

I went with Emeril's recipe because it seemed easy enough and we had all of the ingredients on had. Plus the addition of orange liqueur sparked my interest.

Emeril's Chocolate Souffle
(entitled Chocolate Chocolate Souffle on Foodnetwork.com)

Ingredients
2 teaspoons butter, room temperature
1/2 cup sugar
8 ounces semisweet chocolate, finely chopped (I used Ghiradelli dark chocolate chips)
4 large egg whites
3 large egg yolks
1/4 cup Grand Marnier (we have Cointreau instead)

Directions
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Butter 4 individual ramekins. Sprinkle each ramekin with 1 teaspoon sugar - place in the freezer until ready to use. In a large metal bowl, set over a pot of simmering water, melt the chocolate, whisking it occasionally (I just stuck the chocolate chips in the microwave at 50 percent power, stirring the chocolate every 30 seconds or so to make sure that the chocolate didn't burn). Remove the bowl from the heat.

In a mixing bowl, whisk the egg whites with 1/4 cup of the sugar until stiff and glossy. Whisk the egg yolks into the chocolate one at a time, add the Grand Marnier, and whisk in the remaining sugar. Fold in the egg whites and blend until smooth. Pour the chocolate mixture into the prepared ramekins. Place the ramekins on a baking sheet and bake until they are puffed and somewhat firm, about 20 to 25 minutes (20-21 minutes seemed to be good enough). Remove from the oven and serve with the chocolate sauce and powdered sugar (which I did not have...but would have sprinkled on for a nice black/white contrast for serving).

Given that I was just cooking for two, I made a half recipe making only one small error in my translation. According to the recipe, I should have used 1.5 egg yolks (the full recipe calls for 3) - not thinking, I just plopped both egg yolks that I had separated from the egg whites into the recipe and there was no turning back. I was just hoping that the extra 1/2 yolk would not affect the final product. Luckily - it didn't.

One of the most gratifying aspects of cooking or baking is to see and taste a well executed final product - to know that you were responsible for putting together all of the ingredients in such a way that worked! For me, seeing the souffles pop up over the ramekin was a pure moment of joy. At that point, I didn't really care how they tasted, I had already achieved my goal of making a successful souffle.

Silly, I know...taste is clearly the most important part. Luckily, that too was successful. The chocolate was rich, toned down only by the light texture of the fluffy souffle. Derek said he'd be happy to get it in a restaurant. That's good enough for me - though next time I'll try it with 1/2 an egg yolk less and see if that makes a difference!