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German Omelette

A light egg dish cooked in a pan with milk, flour, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

German Omelette

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Beat the egg yolks and whites separately.

  2. Mix the milk and flour thoroughly, then add to the beaten yolks along with a little salt.

Cook

  1. Grease a moderately hot pan with butter and pour in the mixture.

  2. Cook for about five minutes until nearly done.

  3. Gently fold in the stiffly beaten egg whites, spreading them over the surface.

  4. Run a knife around the edges and turn the omelette onto a heated dish when done.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Whites beaten stiff provide the airy structure that lifts the omelette.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness to the yolk mixture.
Flour
Thickens the batter slightly so it holds together when cooked.
Butter
Greases the pan and adds richness and browning on the surface.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whites must be stiffly beaten and folded in gently. Overmixing deflates the foam, leaving a dense, flat omelette instead of a light one.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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