spinach omelet

Standard Béchamel, so easy it's ridiculous. Children make it. Butter in a pan. BAM ! Sizzle. Flour in equal part. Cook the flour. Add milk. Whip vigorously. Done.

But why stop there? Salt and pepper. Daub of mustard. Onion. Garlic if you feel like it. Garlic powder if you're lazy today. Look what we've done already. Does it get any better? Wine. Splash. Spinach. Wilt. Remove from heat. Add cheese. What kind of cheese? Any kind of cheese !

Cheese is already processed. If you melt in over heat you risk it separating. Don't want that. Let it melt by the heat already there. This is what distinguishes the amateur from the pro, or in our case, the amateur from the knowledgeable amateur.

Now we've got something.

In real life omelets are not stuffed. But we don't care. We stuff them anyway. Let's call these things egg enchiladas then if by calling them omelets it offends anybody, say, somebody from France.

Whip the eggs, three or two, incompletely in a bowl. Don't go all crazy whipped on them. We don't want foam. Here's the thing that's fun; drop a daub of butter into a heated small non-stick pan, a six inch pan will do. The small pan in a set of pans. When the butter melts and turns to oil and begins to brown, pour the incompletely whipped eggs into the pan. It congeals on the bottom immediately while remaining liquid on the top. Gently push the curd from one edge toward the center. It piles up like a mountain range and liquid egg immediately flows into the space evacuated. Do that to the other side. Not all the way to the center of the pan, but almost all the way to the center. East, West, North, and South. Do it again. East, West, North, and South. Now you've got a proper egg curd mountain range in the pan that ripples with the depth of built-up egg curd all across the surface. Lift the pan off the burner and roll it around so the liquid exceeds the edges you've established and sort of crawls up the sides of the pan. This suggests curling edges within the pan. Sprinkle cheese or add the stuffing which are forbidden in some countries but not forbidden in the US. Yay! I love being an American where we're free to stuff our omelets without fear of being arrested by the omelet police.

While it's still a little wet on top, remove from heat and with a spatula in one hand and the pan handle in the other, tilt the pan over a serving plate and coax one edge up and fold it over by 2/3, leaving 1/3 uncovered. This should cover all your stuffing but not necessarily. Do that again by lifting the folded portion over the untouched portion and coaxing the rolled omelet out of the pan and onto the plate. See? You're not just shoveling the omelet out of the pan and onto the plate, but rather, you're holding the pan closely over the plate and gently and skillfully rolling the omelet out of the pan and onto the plate, as much by slowly inverting the pan so that the pan becomes a cover to the omelet rather than the holder of the omelet and so the omelet gently plops near the center of the plate, much as a hospital patient is gently transfered from a bed to a gurney except with a certain rolling action that hospital orderlies do not use. Pretend you know what you're doing. Impress your friends. Once on the plate, tuck in the edges that misbehaved to make it appear as if your roll was flawless even if it wasn't. Then say, "Wallá !" I mean, "Voilá !" Enhance with some remaining filling, some sauce, or some herbs, or just salt and pepper or maybe chile flakes. Nutmeg even. Chives are standard.