ROTW: Mackerel Souffle

One souffle. I think it's my first ever, although I have a niggling memory of attempting one in the crooked house (two feet different in nominally- parallel wall lengths in a single room).

That was... fun. Usually cooking is calming or meditative or sometimes badly stressing, but this one was fun. Probably something to do with all the changes; lots of stirring and whisking and grating going on. Nutmeg especially is a cool thing to grate: you think you've just run it over the grater a couple of times and nothing's happened, and then you lift up said grater and a whole pile of magically- grated nutmeg is just there waiting for you. Some foods are just special like that. Like the eggs: I had a box of Old Cotswold Legbar eggs in the fridge (I have a soft spot for rare breeds, although they're hardly rare now I can buy the eggs in Tescos), and was pleasantly surprised to see that inside those pastel- blue shells are lovely deep orange yolks. The only down was beating the eggwhites. Hwngo showed me that using a stick blended really works on this, so I used mine, and nada. White fluffy mixture, but not a peak in sight. And I couldn't rescue it from there: after 10 minutes of fighting it with a hand whisk, I gave in and made the mixture anyway. Then anxiously watched through the cooker's glass door for half an hour.

I wasn't expecting texture. I've always thought of souffle as a smooth dish, a rolling hill of smooth curves forming a chef's hat shape over the top of the dish. But there it is, in photographic evidence: a textured top (and one that, ta-da, didn't sink when I took it out the oven!). It tastes good too: like the best of soft omelettes collided with a soft cake; worth missing my yoga class for even. The nutmeg and fish balance off each other beautifully, and the only regret I have is that I wasn't a little more adventurous with the pepper; I've been a bit too heavy-handed with it of late (the pestle-and-mortar full of pepper is probably a hint about my culinary proclivities) but I think this dish could take it. Peppered mackeral souffle, anyone?

And I promise when I have both eggs and mackeral in the fridge, the last thing I'll think about cooking is a kedgeree...