The Julia Child Omelette

I've never really understood the allure of omelettes.

When I was a kid, on a summer vacation somewhere in the south, I once ordered something called a "Spanish Omelette." From the outside it looked pretty much as you'd expect: yellow. Upon cutting it open with the fork a red liquid oozed out onto the the plate. It was pretty much visually identical to Campbell's tomato soup. The flavor was a little closer to sweetened catsup, although to be accurate, we should also include the adjective "yucky." Had Marcie been there, cries of "huácala!" would have rung through the restaurant.

So that was kind of my first significant omelette experience, and I have understood each subsequent omelette within that framework. What's the the point of making such a big deal over putting stuff inside of eggs? I think the "Cheeseburger Rule" applies here. That is, just as the additional costs (monetary, caloric, time, fussiness) incurred by the cheese in a cheeseburger do not sufficiently improve the flavor or other qualities of the dish (over a plain hamburger) to warrant its inclusion, neither do the additional ingredients required to turn scrambled eggs into an omelette pass a careful cost-benefit analysis.

Then, maybe a year ago, I saw Alton Brown making a simple omelette. I learned two things from that show: 1) an omelette is not the same thing as scrambled eggs and 2) Alton Brown sometimes kind of overdoes it.

References to Julia Child's version kept popping up, in Bittman's Blog and other places. It turns out that omelettes don't have to be a big deal, they are actually pretty simple, pleasing and quick. I am making these damn things just about every day now. Fun.