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Plain Puffy Omelet
4 eggs 4 tablespoons hot water Salt and pepper Butter Beat the egg-whites until stiff. Beat the yolks until thick and lemon-colored, beat into them the hot water and add salt and pepper. Cut and fold together the yolks and stiffly beaten whites. Melt enough butter in an omelet-pan to grease the bottom and sides of the pan. Turn the egg mixture into the pan and cook over a slow fire until it is puffy and a light brown underneath, then place in the oven until the top is dry. Touch the top of the omelet lightly with the finger and if the egg does not stick to the finger the omelet is done. Do not overcook it or it will shrink or be tough. Loosen the edges of the omelet, slip a spatula or flexible knife under the side next to the handle of the pan, fold one-half over the other and press slightly to make it stay in place, slip on to a hot plate and serve at once.
A classic separated-egg omelet, cooked first on the stovetop and finished in the oven. The whole method turns on stopping while the top is barely set.
- The hingeThe finger test is the real instruction: touch the surface, and if no wet egg clings, take it out. The recipe is explicit that overcooking makes the omelet shrink or turn tough.
- Oven heatThe recipe gives no oven temperature. A moderate oven, around 350F, suits the purpose; two to five minutes is usually enough for four eggs, so check at two.
- Stovetop stage"A slow fire" means low heat. The base should set and colour gently over several minutes; high heat browns the bottom before the interior has any chance to rise.
- The panAn omelet-pan was typically a skillet with sloping sides that let the finished omelet be folded and slid out. Any oven-safe nonstick or well-seasoned skillet of similar size works; avoid a plastic handle.
- Hot waterThe four tablespoons of hot water are not incidental: they turn to steam in the pan and add to the rise, though the stiffly beaten whites do the main lifting.
- FoldingFold while it is still slightly domed. Cutting a shallow score across the centre before folding keeps the top from cracking apart.
- YieldFour eggs serve two people as a main dish, or three or four as part of a larger breakfast. It will not hold; serve it straight from the pan.
The puffy or souffl estic cookery instruction of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries set the puffy or souffl the French folded omelet made from unseparated eggs, and books of the era often printed both. The puffy version was taught as a lesson in the lifting power of beaten whites and steam rather than of any leavening agent. The method also shows how much practical faith was placed in tests done by hand and eye — here, a fingertip pressed to the surface — in kitchens where no timer or thermometer was assumed.