Making an Omelette

This is the way an omelette should
be made. It is important that the fryingpan should be propor tionate to the
number of eggs; in other words, to
the size of the omelette. The fryingpan must be made of iron, not of
aluminium, tin or enamel. And here
I feel I must stress a point essential to
what might be called the background
of omelette-making, namely that the
frying-pan must never be washed with
water but rubbed, when hot, with salt
and tissue–paper, as this is the only
way to prevent sticking.
For three portions, we take six eggs,
break them into a bowl, season them with
salt and freshly ground pepper, and add
a good teaspoonful of water. We beat this
lightly with a fork or the wire–broom, not
the whisk, until large bubbles form on
the top. This takes half a minute; it is fatal
to beat too long. Meanwhile, our fryingpan is getting hot, not too hot, and we

Making an Omelette

drop in an ounce and a half of butter, or
butter and best lard, over a quick flame
for a minute or two, until it gives no
more froth and has turned light golden.
We give our egg-mixture another stir
and pour it into the fan, letting it spread
evenly over the frying–pan.
All this is a swift business, and we
may well feel a few extra heart–beats
and a little breath lessness at that
moment. The flame is now turned down
a little. With a fork or palette-knife (a
fork seems to work particularly well)
we loosen the edges of the omelette
all round and, once or twice, in the
middle, letting the liquid flow into the
empty spaces, taking care always to
move towards the middle.
This takes about two minutes.
Then, keeping as calm as we possibly
can, we fold it. This is easy if we fold
over and pin down with two or three
fork-pricks about an inch and-a-half

of the omelette along one side. Then,
it is quite easy to roll it into shape.
Our omelette should be golden brown
outside and wet inside: baveuse, as the
classical French term says. It is then slid
on to a hot plate and its surface made
shiny with a little butter. This last touch
makes all the difference.
Taken from www.recipetips.com