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Omelette

A cooked egg mixture with cream, salt, pepper, and butter, folded and served.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Omelette

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eggs

  1. Whip the egg whites and yolks together in a bowl for 4 minutes until thick and smooth.

  2. Beat in the cream, salt, and pepper.

Cook and serve

  1. Melt the butter in a clean frying pan over low heat to keep warm.

  2. Pour the beaten mixture into the pan and move it to a hotter part of the stove.

  3. As it sets, carefully slide a broad knife around the edges and under the omelette to allow the butter to flow.

  4. When the middle is just set, use a cake turner to fold one half of the omelette over the other.

  5. Invert a hot platter over the omelette, hold the pan and dish firmly, and quickly turn them over to deposit the omelette on the dish.

  6. If it breaks, join the pieces neatly and garnish with parsley.

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  4. Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Cream and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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 into a foam-free mixture that sets into the omelette's structure when heated.
Butter
Melted in the pan to coat the surface and flow under the set eggs, helping release them.
Cream
Beaten into the eggs to add moisture and a softer, more tender texture.

The step that matters

Moving the pan to a hotter part of the stove. Heat must be raised once the mixture is in the pan so it sets quickly; if it cooks too slowly the eggs toughen and may stick. Keeping the butter warm on low heat first prevents browning before the eggs go in.

“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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