Home › The Principles of Cookery › Almond Omelet
Almond Omelet
Beat four eggs with a little milk for a minute or more. Have ready as many sweet almonds as may be wished, blanched and pounded. Put into an omelet-pan a piece of butter the size of a large egg; let it get quite hot, but not browned; pour in the mixture, stirring it gently until it begins to set. Then arrange it nicely, lay the pounded almonds on the top, and double the omelet over, to cover the almonds completely. Keep shaking the pan, and add a little butter if it seems likely to stick. When it is a nice golden-brown, place it on a hot dish, and cover with a little sifted sugar. Time, five minutes to fry. Probable cost, 7d. Sufficient for two persons.
A sweet omelet of the plainest Victorian kind: four eggs, butter, almonds and sugar, cooked in five minutes. The instructions leave several quantities to the cook, so a few numbers help.
- Butter "the size of a large egg"About 2 oz, or 4 tablespoons. That is generous for a four-egg omelet in a modern non-stick pan; half will do, with the rest held back for the extra knob the recipe allows if it sticks.
- How many almonds"As many as may be wished" is no guide at all. Roughly 2 oz of blanched almonds, pounded to a coarse meal, fills a four-egg omelet without making it heavy. Ground almonds from a packet work, though hand-pounded nuts give a better texture.
- Sweet almonds onlyThe specification of sweet almonds is deliberate. Bitter almonds, sold freely in Victorian grocers for flavouring, contain amygdalin and are not a substitute here in any quantity.
- The milk"A little" means a tablespoon or two. More than that loosens the egg and makes it weep in the pan.
- Pan and heatA pan of about 9 inches suits four eggs. The butter must be hot enough to foam but not colour; browned butter at the start will scorch by the time the omelet is golden.
- The hingeStir only until the egg begins to set, then stop and let the base take colour. Keep stirring and you get scrambled egg that will not fold over the almonds.
- The sugar finishSifted sugar over the top could be glazed with a hot salamander, though the recipe does not ask for it. Thirty seconds under a hot grill gives that effect; plain caster sugar dusted on is perfectly correct as written.
- Cost and yield7d is late-Victorian money and means nothing now. Two servings is right, or one substantial dessert portion.
Cassell's places this among the sweet omelets, a category that has largely fallen out of British cooking but was familiar in the nineteenth century, when an omelette served with sugar and preserves might close a meal rather than open it. Almonds carried the association: blanched, pounded and sweetened, they ran through English dessert cookery from medieval blancmange to ratafias and macaroons. Cassell's Dictionary of Cookery and its later New Dictionary appeared in the later nineteenth century and were reissued over many years, aimed at middle-class households, and the habit of printing a "probable cost" for each dish suggests a readership keeping an eye on the housekeeping accounts.