Saturday, August 11, 2012

Care to have some Morphine with your Eggs?

So for those who don't know, I had a tonsillectomy on Wednesday. Whee! How exciting. (Not. At all. Seriously, this crap hurts.) I am very tired and in a lot of pain and can't eat yummy or exciting foods SO I did quick cooking project the last day I could eat food and decided to save the post for sometime after surgery. Today is that day! Bear with me, as I am still a little fuzzy here.

Scrambled eggs. I think they're probably the first thing most kids learn to cook. They're easy. You can't really mess up a one-ingredient dish. I remember trying to make them by myself at three while everyone in the house slept. Other than the butt-whooping  I got, I did everything fairly correct. Well, that and turning the heat too high. But I digress! The point I am trying to make here is that today, I still love to make breakfast. 

Eggs are one of those foods that when you see them, you think "breakfast."  I do a lot of baking, so for me, I think "cookies," but most people think "breakfast" and stare picturing their favorite kinds of eggs. Sunny side up, over easy, scrambled, poached, boiled or... the omelette.  Omelette's can be simply or complicated, puffy and thick, or thin and silky, filled or have the incredients mixed into the eggs themselves. They can be fried entirely, or baked partially. The kind I tend to make are a thinner, French-style, trifold omelette fried on a griddle and filled. I love to saute onions and tomatoes to toss in, but this morning I went super simple and classic and went for a plain cheese omelette.





Let's start with ingredients. As you can see on the left, not much is required. Good quality eggs, whole milk, half and half, or a splash of whipping cream, butter or margarine, cheese (or whatever filling you want), salt and pepper to taste and a drop of vanilla.
I know the vanilla is going to throw some people off, but trust me, it will NOT make the eggs sweet. There is no sugar in them, so instead its simply a perfume to the dish. One of those things you put in that people taste and say "Hmm. What is that? I can taste something, but I can't tell what it is." Its a tip I learned from one of my big brothers and its truly helped.


Whisk three eggs very well, then mix in your dairy product of choice. Add in the drop or two of vanilla, salt and pepper. Turn your pan onto a medium-low heat and let a pat of butter/margarine melt in the bottom of the pan. Pour the mix into the pan and try to evenly coat the pan. Slowly, it will cook. When most of the liquid-egg is gone, you can add the cheese. This is a slower cooking omelette, but its worth the wait and worth not risking e-Coli.
Lay the fillings you have chosen down the center  in a line, but leave about a half inch to an inch on either end of the line so that your fillings don't ooze or fall out of your omelette.
As a side note, if you choose to put veggies such as mushrooms, tomatoes, peppers or onions in your omelette, this type of omelette needs to have those things cooked before hand, as one the filling goes in there is minimal cook time left.



If you choose to use a cheese filling like me, I left the cheese rest on top of the eggs for about 30 seconds to one minute before I begin to fold my omelette. Then, when ready, I place my spatula under 1/3 of the omelette and flip that 1/3 up and over the filling in the center. Any uncooked egg-liquid will begin cooking from the inside out thanks to the heat from the omelette wrapping up in itself. Next is the hard part, and if you do not have one large or wide spatula, it is completely ok to use two. Lift the middle filled part of the omelette and flip it onto that final third to close the omelette.

Finally, I let it rest there, if I am feeling brave, I might flip it to get a light color on the top, but usually at this point anyone near me is ready to eat and beginning to twitch from having to wait for me to finish, so I slide it off and onto a plate, toss a couple of pieces of toast down with it, and boom! Done. :)












4 comments:

  1. I love making omelettes. These remind me of the ones on Good Eats.

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  2. Me too :) I always think of you and Alton Brown. lol

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  3. Lethia, great post! I love your witty comments; your blog is really fun to read. That omelette looks absolutely delicious!

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