Herve This’s “Molecular Gastronomy”, a series of short essays on various food science topics has a chapter on souffles with suggestions for better souffles. One thing he suggests is to put a heat source under the souffles — for example, preheat a baking stone on the bottom rack of the oven and then bake your souffles on a rack the next slot above the baking stone. Another of his ideas is to “seal the surface in order to prevent the release of bubbles formed inside…[one way to do this] would be to place the souffle under a broiler before putting it in the oven.” I always have baking stones in my oven, so I get the underneath source of heat but haven’t tried the sealing method. Maybe next time…

There is some dissention about whether enough ions transfer to to the eggs to make copper truly a better bowl. Using a pinch of cream of tartar definitely has that effect. OTOH I strongly recommend that one *not* use a plastic bowl because it’s so hard to get oil out of plastic.

I wonder about Potter’s statement about whipping by hand. I have read several recommendations that when using a mixer on egg white to start on slow speed for the first few minutes, and to watch carefully toward the end because it’s possible to overbeat.

Next up – meringue or baked alaska?