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Omelette-very Fine

A baked omelette with ham, parsley, thyme, and a thickened milk base.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Omelette-very Fine

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Beat the eggs separately.

  2. In a saucepan, bring the reserved milk to a boil.

Make the base

  1. Stir in the flour until smooth, then add salt and butter.

  2. Set aside to cool.

  3. Mix the egg yolks, ham, and herbs into the thickened milk.

Bake

  1. Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

  2. Grease a skillet and pour in the mixture.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) until set.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + thymetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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
Yolks add richness and the whipped whites set into a light, airy structure.
All-purpose flour
Thickens the hot milk into a smooth base that holds the omelette together.
Sweet milk
Forms the moist, custard-like base that keeps the omelette tender.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, savory flavor.
Ham
Adds savory, salty flavor throughout the omelette.
Herbs (in the method)
Parsley and thyme add aroma and freshness.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Fold gently and only after the base has cooled. Stirring or folding hard deflates the whites' trapped air, and a hot base can start to cook or thin them, so the omelette loses its lift and rises less when baked.

Swap the thyme

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, milk, flour, butter, ham, parsley):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Tarragonfits about as well
  4. Thymethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, flour, butter, ham, parsley. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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