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Little Omelets
The following is an excellent method of making an omelet when the family come irregularly to breakfast, as the mixture will be perfectly satisfactory after it has stood for some time, provided it is again beaten thoroughly just before frying: Six eggs; one-half teaspoon of salt; one-fourth teaspoon of pepper; one cup of milk. Beat the eggs until light and foaming, and add the other ingredients. Fry a spoonful at a time in a hot frying-pan or on a pancake griddle that has been well buttered. Roll each omelet quickly, when done, like a French pancake, and serve.
A batter of eggs and milk cooked in small rounds and rolled, closer to a thin egg crepe than to a folded omelet. The method exists to feed people as they wander in, so the batter is meant to sit.
- The hingeThe recipe's own condition is that the mixture be beaten thoroughly again just before frying. If you cook in batches over a stretch of time, beat it again each time, since the milk and egg settle on standing.
- Ratio and consistencyA cup of milk to six eggs is a thin, pourable batter by design. It should coat the pan like crepe batter, not mound like scrambled eggs.
- Pan heat"Hot" here means medium, not smoking: hot enough that the batter sets on contact and the underside colors lightly in under a minute. Too hot and the edges crisp and tear before you can roll them.
- Butter, not oilRebutter between each omelet; the recipe calls for a well-buttered frying-pan or pancake griddle. A nonstick or carbon steel pan does the same job with less butter.
- SizeA spoonful means a serving spoon or small ladle, roughly two tablespoons, spread to a four- or five-inch round. Larger than that and rolling gets awkward.
- Roll while hotRoll the moment the top loses its gloss. A cooled egg pancake cracks along the fold.
- Holding the batterModern practice is to refrigerate the bowl, not leave it on the counter, and use it within a day. A covered bowl in the fridge keeps the batter's advantage without the sitting-out.
- YieldSix eggs and a cup of milk make a dozen or more small rolls, enough for four at breakfast. Season more generously than a quarter teaspoon of pepper if you like it forward.
The Butterick Cook Book (1911) came from the pattern and magazine publisher Butterick, whose household titles were aimed squarely at middle-class women running a house with little or no help. That explains the framing here: the recipe's selling point is not flavor but scheduling, a breakfast dish that survives a family arriving at the table in ones and twos. The comparison to a "French pancake" is the period's usual name for what we now call a crepe. Cookbooks of the era are often said to have insisted that a proper omelet be made to order and served instantly, so a batter advertised as keeping well is a small, practical rebellion.