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Egg and Potato Omelet

A skillet omelet made with mashed potatoes, eggs, milk, butter, onion, parsley, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Egg and Potato Omelet

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the potatoes

  1. Peel and boil potatoes until tender.

  2. Drain and mash potatoes until smooth.

Make the mixture

  1. Add butter, minced onion, minced parsley, beaten eggs, hot milk, and salt to the mashed potatoes. Beat together with a fork.

Cook and serve

  1. Melt butter in a skillet.

  2. Press the mixture through a colander into the hot skillet and smooth the top.

  3. Cover and cook until browned.

  4. Fold over, turn out onto a dish, 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. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

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

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  5. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Provide the bulk and soft, starchy body that the omelet is built on.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set into a firm, sliceable omelet.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness so the mashed potato mixture stays tender.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the underside brown in the hot skillet.

The step that matters

Cover and cook until browned. Covering traps steam so the eggs set through the middle, while the hot butter-coated skillet browns the base. Too little heat leaves it pale and wet inside; too much burns the bottom before the center sets.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, butter, parsley, egg, milk. 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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