Chop 2 shallots with a little parsley and cook in hot water. Add 2 tablespoonfuls of caviare and a teaspoonful of lemon-juice; season to taste. Beat 4 eggs with 1 tablespoonful of cream, salt and pepper, and fry in an omelet-pan with hot butter until done. Put the mixture in the centre; turn in the ends and serve at once.
A four-egg omelet with a caviare filling, written in the compressed telegraph style of the book — the header word "Chop" belongs to the first instruction, not the title. The whole thing takes under ten minutes, and almost all of the skill is in not overheating the filling.
- Do not cook the caviareThe roe goes into the shallots off the heat, or over the barest warmth, and only long enough to take the chill off. Held over direct heat the eggs in the roe set, the grains turn granular and gritty, and the flavour turns fishy and flat.
- "Cook in hot water"Probably a small amount of water in a small pan, simmered until the shallots soften and the liquid has nearly gone, rather than a full boil. Drain off anything left before adding the caviare, or the filling will run out of the omelet.
- Which caviareSturgeon roe was the assumed default when this was written and is now farmed and expensive. Salmon roe, trout roe or lumpfish all work here; pressed or salted roe is saltier than fresh, so taste before adding any salt at all.
- Season lastBetween the salted roe and the butter, this dish salts itself. Season the eggs lightly and correct the filling only after the caviare is in.
- Pan and heatAn 8-inch nonstick or well-seasoned steel pan for four eggs. Medium-high heat, butter foaming but not browning; the omelet should be set at the edges and still creamy in the centre when the filling goes in, roughly two minutes.
- "Turn in the ends"Most likely the rolled French style rather than a single fold: fold the two sides over the filling and roll the omelet out onto the plate seam-side down. The recipe says to serve at once, and residual heat will go on cooking the roe on the plate.
- YieldFour eggs and two tablespoons of roe serve two as a light course, or one generously. The recipe scales badly — make two separate omelets rather than one of eight eggs.
The book belongs to a genre popular either side of 1900: a dish a day, each pinned to a country, giving middle-class cooks a tour of the world from a single kitchen. "Russian" here signals caviare, and with it sturgeon from the Caspian and the Volga, which is generally said to have reached Western tables in quantity once refrigerated rail and steamer transport made the trade practical in the late nineteenth century. Caviare with eggs is a genuinely Russian pairing, familiar from blini with sour cream and roe, and the marriage of soft egg, butterfat and salt-cured roe is the reason the combination has never gone out of fashion. The technique, though, is entirely French: the rolled omelet with a filling laid in the centre is Escoffier-era kitchen practice.