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Omelet Aux Fines Herbes

A French omelet flavored with cream, herbs, and onion.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,979 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Omelet Aux Fines Herbes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eggs

  1. Beat the eggs just enough to blend the whites and yolks.

  2. Add the cream, salt, and pepper.

Cook

  1. Whip in the chopped herbs and grated onion just before cooking.

  2. Cook in a preheated pan 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 + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Marjoram + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together615 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set when heated, forming the structure of the omelet.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the omelet tender.
Parsley
Adds fresh, green aroma and flavor to the eggs.
Sweet marjoram
Contributes a mild, sweet, aromatic herb flavor.
Celery tops
Adds a light, savory, herbal aroma to the omelet.

The step that matters

Whip in the herbs and onion just before cooking. Chopped herbs and grated onion release moisture and flavor over time, and adding them late keeps the mixture from weeping and the flavors fresh. Cooking promptly also keeps the eggs from over-setting unevenly.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, cream, pepper, parsley, marjoram, celery):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, cream, pepper, parsley, marjoram, celery. 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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