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Omelet Soufflée

A light, airy omelet made by folding stiff egg whites into a yolk and sugar mixture, baked in butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,227 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Omelet Soufflée

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eggs

  1. Separate the egg whites from the yolks.

  2. Mix the yolks with sugar and minced lemon peel.

  3. Whip the egg whites until stiff, then fold them into the yolk mixture.

Cook and serve

  1. Melt the butter in a heatproof dish over medium heat.

  2. Add the egg mixture to the melted butter.

  3. Place the dish near the fire in a Dutch oven or cover with a very hot lid.

  4. Cook for 5 to 10 minutes until the omelet rises well.

  5. Dust the top with sugar and 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.

  1. Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  5. Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Eggs
Whipped whites trap air and yolks set into a light, risen structure.
Butter
Melted fat coats the dish and enriches the omelet with a rich, tender texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the omelet and helps the yolk mixture hold its flavour and colour.

The step that matters

Fold the whipped whites into the yolks gently. Whites hold air only when stiff, and heavy stirring deflates them. Folding keeps the bubbles intact so the omelet rises well in the heat.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Lemonthe original
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Figfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, 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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