RECIPE

The Good Enough to Eat Breakfast Cookbook

By Carrie Levin with William Perley (Warner Books)

BLT OMELET
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2 Teaspoons clarified butter (see note 1)
1-1/2 slices cooked bacon, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
3 eggs
1/4 cup loosely packed grated Gruyere cheese
1/2 small plum tomato, seeded and cut into 1/4-inch cubes
Yields 1 omelet.

Although this dish has no lettuce in it, at Good Enough to Eat, it has always been famously known as the BLT omelet.
After the butter is good and hot in a pan, scatter in the bacon. Shake the pan once to make sure bacon is not sticking. Now pour in the beaten eggs (see note 2). Tilt and pull a couple of times (see note 3) and sprinkle in the cheese. Pull a couple more times to cook to desired doneness.
Scatter in the tomato pieces, avoiding the edge of the pan. Almost immediately remove the omelet from the pan, flipping it into a half circle on your warmed plate. The tomatoes will be sufficiently warmed by being folded into the omelet at the end of the process and shouldn't be cooked so much as to release their water. Water in the pan will cause sticking.

Note 1: "There are 'impurities' in regular butter that can encourage your eggs to stick to the pan," writes Levin. "These include milk solids, salt and water. Here's how to remove them (to create clarified butter): Heat a stick of butter in a 1/2-quart pot over a medium-low heat. As soon as the butter is melted, skim the foam over from the top. Continue to simmer the butter for about 10 minutes. The excess water will burn off and you will be able to see the bottom of the pot. The results will be about 7 tablespoons of clarified butter."

Note 2: The best way to beat eggs is to use a front-to-back, up-and-down motion, creating a little whirlpool on its side.

Note 3: "The egg will cook at the outside edges almost immediately," writes Levin. "With the points of your fork, pull the egg from the cooked edge toward the center, at the same time tilting the pan in the direction opposite the pull, causing the uncooked egg in the center to flow into the opened area of the pan. Make sure you keep the pan over the heat while you do this pulling and tilting around the four points of the compass. With practice, you will be able to do it without touching the bottom of the pan with the fork. Scraping the bottom of the pan with the fork will cause the egg to stick. The egg will cook quickly and you should keep it moving throughout the process. There is a measure of artistry to this technique, but it is well worth mastering."