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Prawn Omelet
Remove the prawns from their shells and chop them coarse, place them in a basin with a teaspoonful of minced parsley, and three eggs; season to taste with salt, pepper and a small quantity of grated nutmeg, beating all well together. Melt a lump of butter or clarified fat in an omelet pan, put in the above preparation and fry. When done spread a folded napkin or fancy dish-paper over a small dish, put the omelet on it, and serve very hot.
A three-egg omelet with the filling beaten straight into the eggs rather than folded in — quick, but it demands attention at the pan.
- The prawns must already be cooked"Remove the prawns from their shells" starts at shelling and never tells you to cook them, so boiled shell-on prawns are assumed. Raw shrimp chopped into the egg will not cook through in the short time the omelet takes; poach or saute them first, then cool and chop.
- Quantity is not givenFor three eggs, about 4 to 6 oz of peeled cooked prawns is right. Much more and the omelet will not hold together when you turn it out.
- Chop coarse, and dryCoarse is deliberate — you want recognizable pieces. Blot the prawns on a towel first; residual poaching liquid thins the eggs and makes the omelet weep in the pan.
- "A lump of butter"Roughly a tablespoon in an 8-inch pan. The recipe offers clarified fat as an alternative without saying why; it does take higher heat without browning, which suits a pan hot enough to set the eggs on contact.
- "Fry" means about two minutes"Fry" -- The recipe says only "when done", which for an omelet of this size means a couple of minutes at most. Medium-high heat, stirring the eggs in from the edges until they are just set but still glossy on top, then roll or fold and turn out. Held longer, the prawns tighten and the eggs go dry and squeaky.
- NutmegA very small quantity indeed, as the recipe says: a scant scrape. Nutmeg with shellfish and cream dishes was common enough in this period to read as old-fashioned rather than wrong, but it will dominate three eggs if overdone.
- The napkin and dish-paperA folded linen napkin or a cut paper doily under the omelet would absorb any butter that ran out. Whatever the reasoning, it is a service convention; a warmed plate does the same work.
- YieldOne generous portion or two small ones. Omelets of this size do not scale up in a single pan — make them one at a time.