Southern Rocklobster Soufflé

Makes 7 serves

Ingredients

For the soufflé base

200g whole cream milk
1 fresh bay leaf
1 pinch Iranian saffron
100g peeled weight red onion, finely sliced
25g tomalley
2g white pepper, freshly and coarsely ground
50g unsalted butter
50g strong flour
1/2 small nutmeg, freshly grated
15g freshly and finely grated Parmesan Reggiano
130g egg yolk

Other ingredients

Soft butter for buttering the soufflé dishes
Approx 350g plus egg white at room temperature, preferably out of the shell for at least 3 days
Cream of tartar or freshly juiced, strained lemon juice
7 x 50g green Southern Rocklobster leg and knuckle meat
Finely grated Parmesan Reggiano

Method

For the soufflé base

Put the milk, saffron, onion, bay leaf and tomalley into a saucepan and place on low heat.
Bring to the simmer, stirring a couple of times, boil and then turn the heat off.
Allow to stand for 10 minutes then strain off the infused milk.
Weigh out the paprika, pepper, salt, nutmeg and flour; Melt the butter and when it foams, whisk in the flour and cook, stirring constantly for a couple of minutes. Then whisk in the milk and continue whisking until it is thick and comes cleanly away from the bottom of the pan. Stir through the Parmesan and without delay whisk in the egg yolk. Turn the heat off and keep stirring over for a couple of minutes to finish cooking the egg and then scrape it into a bowl. Cover tightly with plastic food wrap and pierce a couple of pin-prick holes in the top to allow the steam to escape.

To serve

Set oven temp to 180°C/350°F
Soufflé dishes carefully buttered before service (and collared if that is how you do it.)
We make soufflés by sight but it is approximately 50g egg white per soufflé.
Put 50g base, 1 portion of rocklobster meat into a bowl and gently mix them together. In a clean bowl with a clean whisk add some egg white and a small pinch of cream or tartar or 5g lemon juice and whisk until the form soft smooth peaks.
If you over beat the egg white, clean the bowl and start again soufflés do not rise or have the right texture when made with dry split egg white.
Mix a heaped kitchen spoon of egg white into the base, and when fully incorporated very gently add another two. Spoon into a prepared soufflé dish, sprinkle the top with Parmesan and put in the oven. They take approximately 20 minutes, centre should be ever so slightly gooey.

Tips - This soufflé CAN be double cooked. Allow them to deflate gently, pushing the tops into the dishes as they deflate so they do not get caught on the top edges of the dishes. While they are still warm (but not hot because they will break) carefully release them from the dishes and place them on trays covered with silicon or baking parchment. Allow them to cool completely and turn the tops up. The will puff again 10-15 minutes in a 200°C/400°F oven.

Anyone can make a high soufflé, that's easy! The hard part is making it taste amazing without tasting eggy or being so full of egg white there is no taste at all. Infusing the rocklobster tomalley into the milk adds the most stunning but subtle rocklobster flavour with none of the bitterness that sometimes accompanies soufflé bases made with bisque stocks.

We put the dishes on small pizza trays just slightly larger than our soufflé dishes and rotate them in order. With care they can be pulled forward rotating them as you go.

Copyright © text, recipes and images Southern Rocklobster Limited and Ann Oliver 2009