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Omelette Aux Fines Herbes

A French-style omelette with shallot, parsley, ham or bacon, cayenne pepper, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Shallot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Omelette Aux Fines Herbes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. In a bowl, beat the eggs well.

  2. Add the shallot, parsley, ham or bacon, cayenne, and salt. Mix well.

Cook and serve

  1. Heat the butter in a frying pan until it bubbles.

  2. Pour the egg mixture into the pan and cook for about 5 minutes until set.

  3. Serve with brown gravy or vinegar.

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. Shallot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Shallot + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,898 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Ham + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,475 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set into the structure of the omelette as they cook, holding the filling together.
Butter
Coats the pan so the eggs release cleanly and adds rich flavour and browning.
Ham or bacon
Adds savoury, salty flavour and a meaty bite to the omelette.
Shallot
Adds a mild onion-like sweetness and aroma to the egg mixture.
Parsley
Adds fresh, green herbal aroma and flavour to the eggs.

The step that matters

Pour the egg mixture into the pan and cook for about 5 minutes until set. Eggs cook quickly once heated, and high heat or overcooking makes proteins tighten and toughen, leaving the omelette rubbery and dry. Cooking gently until just set keeps it tender and moist.

Swap the shallot

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

  1. Shallotthe original
  2. Carrotfits about as well
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Asparagusfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, parsley, ham, pepper, 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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