Cheese omelette

A perfect omelette is one of those under appreciated wonders of life and as the health debate tells us that neither eggs nor cheese are the enemy anymore, and we can enjoy them to our heart’s content, they’re a popular lunch time snack in my household.  For this one, the cheese is all important. Everyone will have a different opinion on the best choice and while my wife loves the added flavourss of an Applewood smoked cheddar and my children love some Red Leicester, for me it’s a simple but extra mature cheddar all the way (Cathedral City to be precise).

Ingredients

• 2 large eggs
• ½ ounce / 10g unsalted butter
• 1 ounce / 30g extra mature cheddar, grated

Method

Beat the eggs in a bowl until smooth and add a pinch of seasoning.

Heat the butter in a frying pan (not too big, otherwise you’ll end up with a thin egg pancake) until the butter begins to froth and bubble.

Pour the eggs into the pan and quickly tilt the pan in a circular motion so that the egg fills the base.

Now, keeping turning and tilting the pan so you’re distributing the heat, and with a spoon, keep lifting the edges of the omelette with the spoon so that the liquid egg is continuously moved around.

You should need to do this for no more than a minute before you have a very thin layer of liquid egg on the surface.  You need to stop before it’s completely cooked as an omelette continues to cook even when taken off the heat.

Sprinkle the cheddar over the entire omelette and fold in half.  Press down with a fish slice for a few seconds.  Flip and do the same the other side.  You want the omelette to just be starting to turn golden (as in the picture).

Serve with the cheese oozing from your omelette!

Trivia

According to legend, when the Emperor Napoleon and his army were traveling through southern France they decided to camp near the town of Bessières, Haute-Garonne. That night, Napoleon feasted on an omelette provided by the local inn-keeper which was such a culinary delight that the Emperor ordered the townspeople to gather all the eggs in the area and prepare a huge omelette for his army the next day. Which is supposed to be how the town came to hold an annual giant omelette festival each Easter. But the world’s largest recorded omelette was cooked 11 August, 2012, by the Ferreira do Zêzere City Council in Santarém, Portugal, which required 145,000 eggs, weighed 6,466kg (14,225 lbs), and was 10.3 metres in diameter.