Home › Eggs › Omelette Robespierre
Omelette Robespierre
3 eggs 1 tablespoon powdered sugar 3 tablespoons hot water 1/8 teaspoon salt 1/2 teaspoon vanilla Beat eggs slightly, and add remaining ingredients. Put one and one-half tablespoons butter in a hot omelet pan, turn in mixture and cook same as French Omelet. Fold, turn on a hot platter, sprinkle with powdered sugar, and score with a hot poker.
Almond Omelet, Caramel Sauce 3 eggs Few grains salt 3 tablespoons caramel sauce 1/2 teaspoon vanilla Beat yolks of eggs until thick and lemon-colored, add caramel, salt, and vanilla, and cut and fold in whites of eggs beaten until stiff and dry. Put three-fourths tablespoon butter in a hot omelet pan, cover bottom of pan with shredded almonds, turn in mixture, and cook and fold same as Plain Omelet. Pour around Caramel Sauce. Pour one cup sugar in omelet pan, and stir constantly, over hot part of range, until melted to a light brown syrup. Add three-fourths cup hot water, and let simmer ten minutes.
A sweet French omelet finished with a branded sugar crust. It cooks in under three minutes, so have the platter, the sugar and the hot iron ready before the eggs go into the pan.
- The hinge: the hot pokerThe scoring is what makes this dish. A steel skewer or the tip of a metal larding needle heated red over a gas flame, laid briefly across the sugared omelet in a lattice, caramelizes lines into the surface. A small kitchen blowtorch does the same job with less drama; a broiler will not, because it melts the whole surface instead of marking it.
- "Powdered sugar"In books of this period powdered sugar generally means a finely ground sugar rather than the cornstarch-laced confectioners' sugar sold today; it is finer than modern granulated. For the sugar inside the eggs either works, and granulated or superfine will serve for the topping.
- The hot waterThree tablespoons of hot water into lightly beaten whole eggs is deliberate: it turns to steam in the pan and helps puff the omelet.
- Pan and heatAn "omelet pan" is a shallow, sloping-sided, well-seasoned pan; the recipe specifies no size or heat level. Work over a brisk heat and keep the eggs moving with a fork until they set in soft curds, then let the bottom take colour for a few seconds before folding.
- Butter quantityA tablespoon and a half is generous by modern habit, but it is what the recipe calls for. Do not let it brown past a light nut colour before the eggs go in.
- YieldThree eggs make one substantial dessert omelet, or two modest servings. It does not scale up in one pan; make a second omelet rather than a larger one.
- Serve at onceThe puff from the steam collapses within a minute or two, and the branded sugar softens. Plate, score and carry it straight to the table.