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Prawn Omelet

A savory omelet with prawns, eggs, butter, parsley, pepper, and cayenne.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Prawn Omelet

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Shell and prepare the prawns, chopping six of them and leaving the other six whole.

  2. Soak the prawns in warm butter seasoned with pepper until needed.

Make the omelet

  1. Beat the eggs well and mix in the chopped prawns, a little salt, minced parsley, pepper, and cayenne to taste.

  2. Heat a good-sized piece of butter in an omelet pan until hot but not brown.

  3. Pour in the egg mixture.

  4. Stir with a flat spoon until it begins to set, then remove the spoon.

  5. Shake the pan to prevent sticking.

  6. When cooked, run a knife around the edges and fold the omelet over with an egg lifter, placing the whole prawns between the folds.

  7. Give one more fold and place on a very hot dish.

Serve

  1. Serve immediately, garnished with parsley or small watercress.

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

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

  2. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Egg + parsleytop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,765 recipes

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

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 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 into a tender structure that holds the omelet together when folded.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavour, and cooks the eggs gently in the pan.
Prawns
Provide the main filling, adding savoury flavour and a tender bite.

The step that matters

Heating the pan and stirring until just set. If the butter is too hot the eggs brown and turn tough. Stirring only until the mixture begins to set keeps the omelet soft and moist, and shaking the pan stops it sticking.

“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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