Passionfruit Soufflés!

I once saw soufflé being described as a hot air balloon that will only stay inflated so long as the air inside remains hot... which is probably how actual hot air balloons work I guess now I come to think about it... 

Despite just blowing my own mind with my hot air balloon revelation, I'm no less stunned by these soufflés! Such a notoriously difficult bake demands patience and precision, which is why I'm so surprised that I pulled them off! 

The first stage in preparing these soufflés is to combine passionfruit puree and sugar in a pan, and allow it to simmer to concentrate the puree. Cornflour dissolved in water is then added to thicken the mixture, and the thickened mixture is left to cool. 

Whilst the puree cools, egg yolks, caster sugar and vanilla paste are are whisked together until the mixture reaches the ribbon stage, before the cooled puree is whisked in as well! In a separate bowl, the egg whites are whisked with a little salt and the cream of tartar until it reaches soft peaks. Caster sugar is then gradually added until the resulting meringue reaches stiff peaks. The meringue mixture is then very carefully folded into egg yolk mixture until combined. 

The meringue, egg yolk mixture, 
and concentrated puree all ready to 
be combined!

Once baked, the soufflés are dusted with icing sugar and topped with a little passionfruit pulp! I'll be honest, it took me three attempts to get this right! The first attempt barely rose during baking, and the second attempt was very underbaked, but third time lucky as they say, as I would argue these soufflés were a success!    

Gibby x