Divya Gugnani: Hi! I am Divya Gugnani.
Caroline Alexa McBride: I am Caroline Alexa McBride.
Divya Gugnani: And we are here at Brasserie Cognac where a true French experience requires paying homage to cheese.
Caroline Alexa McBride: It is true Divs that cheese selection here is so expensive that the chef is even incorporating it into some of the signature dishes.
Divya Gugnani: So let's go behind the burner and see how it is done. I am here at Brasserie Cognac with Executive Chef Florian Hugo. Today is all about cheese Florian. So what we are making?
Florian Hugo: We are going to make -- we are going to celebrate two cheeses, one from France, one from Italy because we actually -- we will run on the board and we are going to make a nice cheese soufflé. We are going to use Beaufort from Artisanal Cheese Company and Parmigiano, the Grana Padano kind. So we are going to make the Roux.
Divya Gugnani: So Roux is a classic mixture of your fat and your starch, right?
Florian Hugo: Exactly we are going to start by boiling milk and white wine because we use white wine for that recipe.
Divya Gugnani: And the wine doesn't break the milk at all, it goes together.
Florian Hugo: No, it doesn't. The white wine brings out that flavor of -- that you find probably in butter. So the Roux is always 50% butter and 50% flour. Cayenne pepper --
Divya Gugnani: It is an interesting choice, but it is a very good complement with cheese.
Florian Hugo: It use to be well it does it, and also we have nutmeg and I whisk real hard all together.
Divya Gugnani: Wow! Look that.
Florian Hugo: And in fact when we prepare this in a kitchen we will make a big batch and we will let it cool very slowly, sometimes for an hour so that we can do less minutes binding because the Roux is already ready, the flour is cooked.
Divya Gugnani: You can use the Roux for so many different things. You use the Roux to thicken sauces and --
Florian Hugo: Whether they are cold or hot or fish or meat, so the milk is almost boiling, it is pretty good now. So it is going to be a thick, very thick because Chanel is going to be mixed afterwards with egg whites. So it is really a thick base that's going to be diluted afterwards. Plus we are going to add some cheese. We are going to add the cheese and then when it becomes warm, we will add the egg yolks and if you want to add truffle, you can add some now.
Divya Gugnani: Love some truffle.
Florian Hugo: So now are going to mix those whites at maximum speed. Now the egg whites are ready and you have to -- once they are beaten you have to make the mix right away because they are going to -- otherwise they will start separating.
Divya Gugnani: Right and they will start falling.
Florian Hugo: Right and you will some water in the bottom and we will loose the whole structure of the egg white. We are just going to mix thoroughly a little bit of both and those are just going to sacrifice and we are going to mix them pretty fast just so that both can start blending well. So now we are going to put this preparation in soufflé mold that we first buttered with, which is just a soften butter, not melted not hard just enough -- just like a paste, just like a cream.
Divya Gugnani: So when you butter a dish or you are buttering a baking pan it is the same type of butter that is just that soft butter, cover the dish.
Florian Hugo: Same it is regular we use the -- exactly. You want to be careful try not to touch the sides and that will make sure that there is no poach of bubbles of air so we just tap a little bit.
Divya Gugnani: Kind of even it out.
Florian Hugo: Even it out and we can put this in then oven for about 15 minutes at 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
So it is now 15 minutes, we can check, nice and firm so there is no more cooking needed. We are just going to put a drizzle of oil on it. Not too much is overwhelming.
Divya Gugnani: Florian the aroma is intoxicating.
Caroline Alexa McBride: Wow! It is so light and airy, look how fluffy it is.
Divya Gugnani: The saltiness of the soufflé comes through with the cheese flavor. Behind the Burner members can enjoy this exclusive opportunity to purchase Chef Florian's favorite cheeses from Artisanal Cheese. Stay tuned to Behind the Burner where we give you the tips, tricks and techniques that are lighting the culinary world on fire.
Caroline Alexa McBride: Santé.
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