Skip to main content
Main

Clam Omelet

A savory omelet folded over a clam and butter sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Clam Omelet

Ingredients

Directions

Make the clam sauce

  1. Heat the butter in a saucepan and stir in the flour until it bubbles.

  2. Thin the mixture with hot cream and boiling clam juice.

  3. Season with cayenne or paprika and onion juice, then mix in the chopped clams.

  4. Keep the saucepan in boiling water to keep the mixture hot without boiling.

Make and fill the omelet

  1. Beat the eggs and cream together until light.

  2. Melt butter in an omelet pan over heat, then pour in the egg mixture.

  3. Shake the pan to prevent sticking and cook until the omelet is set.

  4. Spread the clam mixture on the omelet and fold it.

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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Clam + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together840 recipes

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

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Clams
Provide the main savory flavor and the filling's texture.
Eggs
Set when cooked to form the body of the omelet.
Butter
Adds richness and helps keep the flour-thickened sauce smooth and the omelet from sticking.
Flour
Thickens the butter and cream mixture into a smooth sauce.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness to both the sauce and the egg mixture.

The step that matters

Keep the saucepan in boiling water without boiling the mixture. Gentle, indirect heat keeps the clam sauce hot and thick without scorching or overcooking the clams. Vigorous boiling can cause the flour-thickened sauce to break or become grainy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clam, butter, flour, cream, egg):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against clam, butter, flour, cream, egg. 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.

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipesYorkshire PuddingYorkshire Pudding264 recipes