Lighter Than Air

In the pantheon of cookbook writers, everyone talks about Julia Child and everyone talks about Irma Rombauer (though she usually just gets called "Joy"). Your personal pantheon probably includes others - the utilitarian Mark Bittman, the idiosyncratic Tessa Kiros, the scholarly Elizabeth David. For me, one of the books that has permanent shelf space is Craig Claiborne, also known as the New York Times Cookbook. It's less frou-frou than Julia, more elegant than Joy. My copy falls open to page 488 because that's our go-to waffle recipe. When I want to make a gingerbread house, I add some extra flour to the recipe for gingerbread men that's on page 579. And Craig, not Julia, taught me how to make a souffle. Well, my mother probably helped, but it's Craig's recipe that I turn to when I need to make a cheese souffle.

And you know what? It's easy and delicious and you probably have all of the ingredients you need. Because I have a family of three people and a smallish souffle dish, I scaled the recipe down to fit my dish, and because I'm nice, I'm giving you both sets of measurements. Make one. Serve it up with a salad. You can make it on a school night, and your six year old will probably even eat it - because really? It's not much more than fancy eggs.

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CHEESE SOUFFLE à la CRAIG

For a 2 quart dish		For a 1 1/2 quart dish
4 T. butter (1/2 stick)		3 T. butter
1/4 cup flour		3 T. flour
1 1/2 cups milk		1 1/8 cups milk (9 ounces)
Salt		Salt
Worcestershire sauce		Worcestershire sauce
Cayenne pepper		Cayenne pepper
1/2 pound grated cheddar*		3/8 pound grated cheddar*
4 eggs, separated		3 eggs, separated

1. Preheat oven to 375° F.
2. Make a white sauce: Melt the butter in a saucepan over low heat. Add the flour and stir with a wire whisk until blended. Meanwhile, warm the milk**, then add it all at once to the flour/butter mix, stirring vigorously. Season to taste with salt, Worcestershire and cayenne.
3. Take pan off heat and let cool for a couple of minutes. Add the cheese and stir until melted. Beat in the egg yolks one at a time and cool.
4. Beat the egg whites until they stand in peaks. Cut and fold the egg whites into the cheese sauce (you can do this in the saucepan). Put your nice light fluffy stuff into the souffle dish you chose at the beginning and bake for 30-45 minutes. You don't have to grease the dish, but I like to butter it and then sprinkle it with grated parmesan.

*You have no cheddar? Use swiss, or gouda, or pepper jack, or whatever you have. Or a mix. I'm easy. But I think you might want to avoid Velveeta.

**Or don't. Instructions for a white sauce or a béchamel usually tell you to scald or heat or warm the milk. I tend towards the lazy, so I don't always bother and it's not been a problem.