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Plain Omelet

A simple egg omelet seasoned with salt and pepper, cooked in 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 ↓

Plain Omelet

Ingredients

Directions

Make the egg mixture

  1. Combine eggs, salt, and pepper in a bowl.

  2. Beat vigorously with a fork for 12 beats.

  3. Add milk or cream and mix well.

Cook and serve

  1. Heat butter in an omelet pan over medium heat until frothy.

  2. Pour in the egg mixture and shake the pan over a quick fire until the eggs are set.

  3. Roll the omelet and turn it onto a dish.

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Pepper + milktop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set into a delicate structure that forms the body of the omelet.
Milk or cream
Adds moisture and tenderness to the set eggs.
Butter
Lubricates the pan and adds richness and flavor to the omelet.

The step that matters

Shake the pan over a quick fire until the eggs are set. Eggs turn from liquid to firm as their proteins coagulate; cooking too slowly or too long makes them tough and dry. Keeping the heat quick and the eggs moving keeps the omelet tender.

“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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