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Omelet

A quick egg omelette with milk, flour, herbs, and optional ham or tarragon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Omelet

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk, and flour.

  2. Stir in the parsley, green onions or chives, pepper, salt, and nutmeg.

Cook and serve

  1. Heat butter in a small frying pan until melted.

  2. Pour the batter into the pan and cook until the bottom is golden brown.

  3. Flip the omelet and cook the other side until golden.

  4. Fold the omelet in half and serve hot.

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. Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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 omelet as they cook, holding it together.
Milk
Adds moisture, keeping the omelet tender rather than dry.
Flour
Thickens the batter slightly, helping it hold together when folded.
Butter
Fat for frying that browns the surface and adds flavor.

The step that matters

Cook the bottom until golden, then flip. Over-high heat browns the bottom before the eggs set, while low heat leaves the top wet. Cooking gently until the base is set and golden lets the flip and fold work cleanly.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, flour, parsley, pepper, nutmeg, 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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