Ham Omelet
1/2 Tablespoon Cornstarch 1 Cup Milk 3 Eggs 1 Tablespoon Butter 1/2 Cup Minced Ham Cook the cornstarch in the milk. Add the beaten eggs and ham and beat again.
Melt the butter in an omelet pan, and add the omelet. Serve very hot.
A cornstarch-bound omelet of the sort that fills out three eggs into a dish for a family. The proportions are unusually wet, so the handling matters more than the ingredient list suggests.
- Cool the milk base firstCook the cornstarch and milk to a thin white sauce, then let it cool to lukewarm before the beaten eggs go in. Poured in hot it will set the eggs into curds on the spot, and the omelet will never come together.
- This is a very loose batterA cup of milk to three eggs is closer to a savoury custard than to a folded omelet. Expect something soft and spoonable rather than something you can roll; it will not hold a shape when turned out.
- Heat and time, which the recipe omitsCook gently over medium-low heat and give it time; with this much milk the centre will need considerably longer than a plain folded omelet, and covering the pan (or finishing it in a moderate oven) helps set the top. The original specifies neither heat nor duration.
- "Omelet pan"In this period the term generally meant a heavy pan, often iron, used for omelets; some households kept one for the purpose. Any well-seasoned or nonstick skillet of moderate size does the same work.
- The hamUse fully cooked ham, minced fine. Cured hams of the period were often saltier than much modern packaged ham, so taste before adding any salt; the original calls for none, presumably relying on the ham.
- YieldTwo generous servings, or three at a breakfast with other dishes.
Bridal cook books were a familiar American gift genre around the turn of the twentieth century: short, cheap, often arranged by course, and aimed at a young woman setting up her own kitchen. Recipes like this one show the habit of extending eggs with a starch-thickened milk — a cup of white sauce turns three eggs into a dish for two or three — and the cornstarch would also help steady the mixture over an uneven range. Similar milk-and-egg omelets appear in period general cookbooks under various names.