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Tomato Omelet

A quick omelet with tomatoes, bread, and fat, garnished with parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Tomato Omelet

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the bread pieces in the canned tomatoes for several minutes.

Cook the omelet

  1. Heat half of the fat in a hinged omelet pan until bubbling hot.

  2. Beat the eggs and pour an equal amount into each side of the pan.

  3. Add the soaked bread and tomatoes, and season with salt and pepper.

  4. Reduce the heat and use a silver knife to prevent sticking, tilting the pan to allow liquid to flow underneath.

  5. When still soft, fold one half of the omelet over the other and slide it onto a hot platter.

  6. Garnish with parsley and serve.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Tomato + parsleytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,398 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Tomato + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,013 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set into the structure of the omelet as they cook, holding the filling together.
Bread pieces
Soak up tomato liquid and add body, keeping the filling soft and moist.
Canned tomatoes
Add moisture and acidity, flavoring the eggs and softening the bread.
Fat
Greases the hot pan so the omelet releases cleanly and browns lightly.

The step that matters

Reduce the heat and tilt the pan. High heat toughens and browns egg proteins too fast, so the omelet can scorch or stick before it sets. Lowering the heat lets the eggs set gently while tilting lets uncooked egg flow underneath.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, bread, butter, pepper, parsley):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, bread, butter, pepper, 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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