Kidney Omelet
4 kidneys 6 tablespoonfuls Crisco 6 eggs Salt and pepper to taste 1 tablespoonful chopped parsley 2 tablespoonfuls cream Melt 2 tablespoonfuls Crisco in frying pan. Skin kidneys and cut into small dice and toss them into hot Crisco three minutes. Whisk whites of eggs to stiff froth, then add yolks, seasonings, parsley, and cream, then add kidney. Make remaining Crisco hot in omelet pan or frying pan, pour in omelet and fry over clear fire six minutes. When the edges are set, fold edges over so that omelet assumes an oval shape; be careful that it is not done too much; to brown the top, hold pan before fire, or put it in oven; never turn an omelet in the pan. Slip it carefully on a hot dish and serve the instant it comes from the fire.
A separated-egg omelet — closer to a soufflé omelet than the French rolled kind — with diced kidney folded through. The whole thing hinges on not overcooking, either the kidney or the eggs.
- Which kidneysThe recipe just says "4 kidneys." Four to a dish with six eggs points to lamb's kidneys, which run about 2 oz each and would give roughly half a pound of meat. A single beef or veal kidney would be far too much and far too strong for six eggs.
- Trimming"Skin" means peel off the papery membrane, then halve each kidney and cut out the white core and any visible fat and tubes. Some cooks soak lamb kidneys in cold salted water or milk for 20 minutes to mute the ammoniac edge; drain and pat very dry or they will steam rather than sear.
- CriscoCrisco was new hydrogenated vegetable shortening when this book was written, and the book exists to sell it. Butter or a neutral oil works better here for flavor. Six tablespoons total is generous by modern taste — two for the kidneys and one to two in the omelet pan is plenty for a nonstick or well-seasoned skillet.
- Three minutes on the kidneyThat is enough for small dice over high heat, and it should be. Kidney cooked past medium turns grainy and bitter, and it gets a second cooking inside the omelet. Sear until just browned outside and faintly pink within, then set aside and let it cool slightly before folding it into the eggs so it does not slacken the whites.
- "A clear fire"A coal or wood fire burned down past the smoking stage — steady, moderate heat, roughly medium on a modern burner. Six minutes is about right for a six-egg omelet in a 10-inch pan; the center should still be visibly soft when you fold it.
- Browning the topWhere the original says to hold the pan before the fire, use the broiler for 30 to 60 seconds with the rack low, or a very hot oven for a minute or two. Use a pan with an ovenproof handle.
- Never turn itWorth taking seriously with a whisked-white omelet: flipping collapses the foam and the whole point of separating the eggs is lost. Fold and slide.
- YieldSix eggs and half a pound of kidney serve three to four as a main course, or four to six at a breakfast or supper table alongside other dishes. It will not hold — serve it off the pan.
This comes from the era when Procter & Gamble was working hard to persuade American cooks that a hydrogenated cottonseed-oil shortening belonged in every dish that had previously called for butter, lard or drippings; A Calendar of Dinners, by Marion Harris Neil, is one of a family of Crisco-sponsored cookbooks in which the product appears in nearly every recipe, sometimes in places no cook would think to put it. The dish itself is older and thoroughly British: devilled and sautéed lamb's kidneys were a fixture of the Victorian and Edwardian breakfast sideboard, and folding them into an omelet was one of the ways a small quantity of organ meat could be turned into a course. Offal was cheap, perishable, and expected on the table in a way it no longer is — a household that bought a whole animal or shopped daily at the butcher had kidneys to use up, and recipes like this one are the evidence. The insistence that an omelet be served "the instant it comes from the fire" reflects what was general professional doctrine in the period rather than any single chef's rule, and it has not improved with age.