Name: Omelette Aux Fines Herbes
Ingredients: 4 large eggs; 2 tablespoons melted butter; 2 tablespoons chopped parsley; 1 tablespoon chopped shallot; Salt to taste; Pepper to taste; Optional: minced marjoram, thyme, garden-cress, celery leaves, finely chopped green chili, chopped ham, tongue, bacon, corned beef, or cooked vegetables

Why it works: Parsley and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,979 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Omelette Aux Fines Herbes

Ingredients

4 large eggs
2 tablespoons melted butter
2 tablespoons chopped parsley
1 tablespoon chopped shallot
Salt to taste
Pepper to taste
Optional: minced marjoram, thyme, garden-cress, celery leaves, finely chopped green chili, chopped ham, tongue, bacon, corned beef, or cooked vegetables

Directions

Prepare

Heat a pan over high heat until hot.
In a bowl, beat the eggs with salt and pepper.

Cook

Pour the egg mixture into the hot pan.
Cook until the edges begin to set, then add melted butter and herbs.
If using, add any additional ingredients like ham or vegetables.
Fold the omelette in half and slide it onto a warm dish.

Serve

Serve immediately.

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.

Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,979 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,737 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,609 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Shallot + marjoramtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together287 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: Set into the structure of the omelette as they cook, holding it together.
Melted butter: Adds richness and moisture, and helps keep the omelette from sticking to the pan.
Parsley: Adds fresh, green flavour and aroma to the eggs.
Shallot: Adds a mild, sweet onion-like aroma and flavour.

The step that matters

Cook until the edges begin to set, then add butter and herbs. Eggs cook quickly and become tough and rubbery if overcooked. Stopping while the centre is still slightly moist keeps the omelette tender, and folding it while the surface is still soft lets it finish gently on the warm dish.

Swap the marjoram

The recipe marks marjoram as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, butter, parsley, shallot, pepper):

Capersfits better
Tarragonfits better
Thymefits better
Marjoramthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, parsley, shallot, pepper. 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.

Rice Gruel28 recipes

Peptoned Milk Gruel9 recipes

Like knowing why a recipe works?

The free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.

Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.

Omelette Aux Fines Herbes