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Omelette

A light, airy omelette made by folding whipped egg whites into a sweet yolk mixture and baking until risen.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Omelette

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Separate the whites and yolks of the eggs.

  2. Mix the yolks with sugar and orange flower water or lemon extract.

  3. Whip the egg whites until very firm.

  4. Gently fold the whipped whites into the yolk mixture.

Cook and finish

  1. Melt butter in a frying pan to coat it.

  2. Pour the omelette mixture into the pan and cook on low heat, ensuring it doesn't burn.

  3. Once firm, turn the omelette onto a serving dish.

  4. Sprinkle sugar on top.

  5. Place the omelette in the oven until risen.

  6. Glaze again with sugar before serving.

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Sugar + orangetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  5. Orange + buttertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,301 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

Sugar and orange barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,212 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

Eggs
Whipped whites trap air for lift, and yolks add richness and set structure as the omelette cooks.
Sugar
Sweetens the omelette and, sprinkled on top, caramelises lightly to form a glaze.
Butter
Coats the pan so the omelette releases easily and browns lightly on the base.

The step that matters

Gently fold the whipped whites into the yolk mixture. Overmixing knocks air out of the whipped whites, so the omelette loses the lift that makes it soufflé-like and rise in the oven.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Lemonfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, 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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