Skip to main content
Main

Egg Omelette

A baked omelette made with milk, eggs, corn starch or flour, butter, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Egg Omelette

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderately hot oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Dissolve the corn starch or flour in a little milk.

  3. Beat the egg whites and yolks separately.

Mix and bake

  1. Combine the milk, egg yolks, and dissolved corn starch or flour.

  2. Season with salt to taste.

  3. Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

  4. Melt the butter in a baking pan.

  5. Pour the mixture into the pan and bake for about 20 minutes.

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. Corn + walnuttop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together349 recipes

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

  3. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  4. Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,345 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Butter + walnuttop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Whites trap air for lift, while yolks add richness and help set the custard-like texture.
Milk
Provides the liquid base and moisture that gives the omelette its tender, custardy body.
Corn starch or flour
Thickens the liquid mixture so it holds together and sets softly rather than running.

The step that matters

Gently fold in the beaten egg whites. Egg whites hold air bubbles that give lift. Stirring or deflating them vigorously knocks out that air, leaving a dense, flat result instead of a light one.

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Lima beansfits about as well
  2. Almondfits about as well
  3. Pecansfits about as well
  4. Walnutthe original

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

You might also like

Corn FrittersCorn Fritters203 recipesCream of Corn SoupCream of Corn Soup50 recipesGreen Corn SoupGreen Corn Soup46 recipesCornmeal GruelCornmeal Gruel41 recipes