hello this is chef john from food wishes comm with sweet potato souffle that's
right it's a proven fact that people love puffy food and my all-time favorite
puffy food is souffle and not just because souffles are gorgeous and
delicious and versatile but also because people think these are really hard to
make which they most certainly are not alright not even close especially this
sweet potato version which eliminates like half the usual steps so with that
let's go ahead and get started by roasting a couple sweet potatoes and I
do recommend the orange flesh variety for this ok sometimes even the ones that
are red on the outside are actually white on the inside so what I'll do if
I'm not sure is give them a scrape and I'll check the color and these were in
fact orange and then what we'll do before we roast these is sort of prick
them here and there with the tip of a knife because apparently that lets the
steam out and they won't explode hey that's what I heard and then once that
set we'll go ahead and cook these either by roasting them in the oven or doing
them in the microwave which is what I did but either way we're gonna roast or
cook these until they're very very very tender all right one of the only ways to
screw up this recipe is to not cook these soft and then we're just gonna let
these sit until they're cool enough to handle and I could have waited a little
longer since these were still really hot and this step hurt a little more than it
should've but I should mention these are way easier to scoop if they're warm or
hot than if they're cold and of course if you're smart you could always put a
towel in your hand but anyway we'll go ahead and scoop out all that beautiful
soft tender golden flesh and if you've cooked these long enough you should end
up with a pretty smooth mash but if not feel free to blitz these in your food
processor or just work them over with a potato masher and then what we'll do
once we're done with those tuber maneuvers is move on to the rest of the
prep which will include separating some eggs okay we're gonna put the yolks in
one bowl and the whites in another and we could do that using the classic Zelda
shell method or they're more fun and provocative let the white slip through
your fingers method okay both will work but no matter which one you use remember
it's always okay to get a little bit of the white in the yolks but we never want
to get any of the yolk in the whites because that's going to make it a lot
- whip so please be careful and then once our eggs are separated the only
other prep we have to do would be to butter some ramekins very very
generously okay do not be shy with the butter and rub it all over all the way
to the top of the rim and as you can see we're going to cook these on a baking
sheet and once those are set we can move on to make our soufflé batter which
could not be easier since all we're gonna do is add one generous cup of our
mashed sweet potatoes to our bowl of egg yolks and we'll also toss in a splash of
milk and then I'm gonna go ahead and season this very simply with nothing
more than some kosher salt in a very enthusiastic shaking of cayenne and then
we can take a whisk and give this a mix and by the way whenever you're mixing
ingredients were one is thin and one is thick you're splashy potential is
extremely high so we want to go a little bit slow when we start and then once it
comes together you can crank up the rpms and once we do have that mix nice and
smooth we can move on to our egg whites which we're gonna beat with a whisk but
not before adding a pinch of salt and that's not just for flavor that salts
also gonna help us whip these up into beautiful peaks and in case you're
tempted to use your mixer don't okay this is gonna happen in a surprisingly
short amount of time okay so just use nice long circular
strokes until we have some very luxurious relatively soft but still
well-defined peaks so those are looking perfect right there
and then once those are set we're gonna add exactly half to our other bowl and
we will sort of fold and stir that in and the reason we're doing two additions
is this first one just lightens the mixture to get it ready for the second
addition which is the much more important addition so this first half we
don't have to use quite as light a touch okay we can be a little more aggressive
with it and then once we have that first half folded in we'll go ahead and add
the rest and we'll go ahead and fold that in being a little bit careful not
to knock out too much of the air okay so basically we're working our spatula
underneath bringing that batter up over the top and as we're doing that we're
turning our bowl and eventually in a minute or two we should have everything
nicely folded in and the better you are doing this and the more air you retain
in this mixture the higher the souffle are gonna puff and one very important
thing here is knowing when to stop okay we're only gonna spatulate this until
the egg whites have almost but not quite totally disappeared all right they're
gonna be like 96% incorporated but if we happen to see a little egg white here
and there that's fine because that's all gonna get mixed in as we spoon these
into the ramekins which by the way is the next step so let's go ahead and take
a spoon and carefully transfer that in being as gentle as humanly possible and
I'm gonna suggest we fill these all the way to the top and by the way the amount
of mixture we made is going to make between four and six depending on the
size you ramekin so I actually could have baked a fifth one but I didn't have
the ramekin prepped so I just did four for the video and that's it once those
are filled we're ready to transfer them into the center of a 425 degree oven for
about 15 minutes or so or until they're beautifully browned and fully inflated
and hopefully look a little something like this and as I probably mentioned in
every other souffle video we've ever done if you're gonna take pictures and
or and press your friends make sure you do that right when these come out of the
oven because they are gonna deflate in a matter of minutes all right I took some
pictures and this is what they look like literally three minutes later okay still
gorgeous and amazing but they just don't have quite the same verticality and then
what we'll do to serve is carefully transfer that onto a plate and then I
decided just for fun to garnish the top with a fried sage leaf which of course
is optional and up to you I mean you guys are after all the pips of what
looks like green lips but anyway let me go ahead and grab a spoon and dig in
while this is still hot and I could not have been happier with the taste or
texture all right we want this moist but not wet and it really should be
feather-light with a texture that's ethereal bordering on otherworldly which
is pretty much what I achieved and the flavor really was that of pure sweet
potato which is what I was going for here but in the blog post I'm gonna give
you some other ideas of what to add to this as well as how to turn it into an
amazing dessert so above and beyond being beautiful and delicious this is
very versatile and will work as a first course or dessert or we could even
unmold them which will totally work if use enough butter and serve them like
this is a side dish oh yes a platter of those would look
nice next to your turkey so just another idea speaking of which if you were just
thinking I would take some maple syrup and stir in a whole bunch of cayenne and
use that to garnish the plate I like how you're thinking because that's what I
thought and it really did work out amazingly well but anyway that's it how
to make a sweet potato souffle whether you end up doing this is a fantastic
first course or a sublime side dish or an extremely light yet still decadent
dessert I really do hope you give these a try soon so head over to food wishes
calm for all the ingredient amounts of more info as usual and as always enjoy
you