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Friars Omelet

An apple and breadcrumb omelet baked in a pie dish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,706 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Friars Omelet

Oven, in the book's wordsA good oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a good oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the apples

  1. Pare and core the apples.

  2. Stew the apples with sugar and butter until they turn into a pulp.

  3. Let the mixture cool.

Assemble and bake

  1. Stir in the beaten eggs.

  2. Grease a pie dish and line it with breadcrumbs.

  3. Pour the apple mixture into the dish and cover with more breadcrumbs.

  4. Bake for 1 hour at 400°F (200°C).

Serve

  1. Turn out the omelet and sprinkle sugar over it.

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. Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,706 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together16,478 recipes

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

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

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

Apple and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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

Apples
Break down into a pulp to form the body of the omelet and provide sweetness.
Eggs
Bind the apple pulp and set during baking to give the omelet structure.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavor and softening the apple pulp.
Breadcrumbs
Form a crisp, lightly browned coating on the dish and top of the omelet.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool before adding the eggs. If the stewed apple is still hot, it can scramble the beaten eggs instead of blending smoothly. Cooling first keeps the eggs fluid so they set evenly into a uniform custard-like layer during baking.

Swap the apple

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, egg, sugar. 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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