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Asparagus Omelet

A light egg omelet with boiled asparagus and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 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 ↓

Asparagus Omelet

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the egg mixture

  1. Beat the eggs very lightly, combining the whites and yolks.

  2. Add the milk and the boiled, cold, finely chopped asparagus tops.

Cook the omelet

  1. Heat a frying pan with the butter until hot but not frying.

  2. Pour the egg mixture into the pan, shaking it from the bottom as it cooks.

  3. Loosen the omelet from the pan with a spatula, fold it in half, and turn it onto a hot 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. Milk + asparagustop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together650 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Egg + asparagustop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,338 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Asparagus + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,026 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set to form the body of the omelet as they cook.
Milk
Adds moisture, keeping the omelet tender rather than dry.
Asparagus tops
Adds flavor and color, with a little texture in the finished omelet.
Butter
Fat that coats the pan and helps the omelet release and brown lightly.

The step that matters

Pour the egg mixture into the pan, shaking it from the bottom as it cooks.. Keeping the pan hot but not frying and shaking the eggs moves liquid egg to the hot surface, so the omelet sets gently and stays tender. Too much heat makes eggs tough and rubbery.

Swap the asparagus

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

  1. Potatofits about as well
  2. Asparagusthe original
  3. Chivefits less well
  4. Leekfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, butter. 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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