No. 2896

Hunter's Omelet

Omelette au Chasseur

Mince some cepes finely; fry them in oil over a hot fire with a little garlic, salt and pepper; add these to an omelet prepared as follows: Fry a little bread-crumbs or small croutons in butter, mix them into beaten eggs seasoned with salt and pepper and make the omelet as explained for parsley omelet (No. 2903). Fill the omelet with the cepes. Pour a hunter's sauce (No. 480) around when dressed.

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For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer writes for cooks who already know his other numbered entries, so this reads as a set of cross-references. The two things to settle before starting are the mushrooms and the sauce.

CepesCèpes are porcini (Boletus edulis). Fresh ones are seasonal and expensive; 1 oz dried porcini soaked in warm water for 20 minutes, squeezed dry and chopped will serve for a two- to three-egg omelet. Save the soaking liquid for the sauce.
Hunter's sauceSauce chasseur, No. 480 in the same book. In its classical form it is shallots and sliced mushrooms sweated in butter, deglazed with white wine, finished with tomato and a brown sauce or demi-glace; Ranhofer's own No. 480 is not reproduced here, so look it up. A few tablespoons of a good reduced veal or beef stock with tomato and tarragon stands in acceptably; the omelet does not need much.
The croutonsThe fried crumbs or small croutons go into the raw egg, not on top. Let them cool a little first so they do not start setting the egg in the bowl, and keep them small enough to stay suspended rather than sink.
French method, not AmericanThe parsley omelet he refers to (No. 2903) is not reproduced here, but Ranhofer's omelets follow the French pattern: a hot pan, the eggs kept moving, cooked quickly and folded while the centre is still soft. It is not a set, browned, folded-over diner omelet.
Oil then garlicThe original puts the garlic in with the mushrooms from the beginning. If you would rather not risk scorching it, cook the cèpes hard in oil until the water has gone and they colour, and add the garlic towards the end.
QuantitiesThe original gives none, which is normal for this book. Three eggs, about 3 oz of prepared mushrooms and a small handful of croutons makes one generous serving; scale by making separate omelets rather than one large one.
Assembly orderHave the sauce hot and the mushrooms hot before the eggs touch the pan. The omelet is the last thing made and cannot wait; filled, rolled onto the plate, sauce spooned in a ring around it, served.

A Little History

This is entry 2896 in Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894), the encyclopaedic record of the food he cooked over some three decades at Delmonico's in New York. "Chasseur" — hunter — is used in French kitchens as a shorthand for mushrooms, shallots and white wine, the flavours associated with autumn game cookery, and it attaches to a whole family of dishes from chicken chasseur down to this omelet, where no game appears at all. The cèpe is the point of the name: a wild forest mushroom, gathered rather than grown, and one an American kitchen of the 1890s would most likely have met dried or imported. Ranhofer builds this dish out of numbered references to two other entries in his own book, which suggests a reader working with the volume open on the counter.