Puffy Jam Omelet

For the second leg in our journey through the CWA Calendar of Puddings, we selected October 27th's Puffy Jam Omelet.

Looking back at it now, there were a few warning signs.

First there was the name: 'Puffy Jam Omelet' should have given us a moment's pause. Puffy is not generally a word associated with all things delicious. Jam, while an excellent foodstuff, isn't usually considered these days to be a good option for the primary flavour for things other than jam. And omelettes (however they're spelled) aren't the sort of food that I generally associate with dessert. We made an unspoken pact not to share the name of the pudding with our diners, in the hope of not poisoning them to the whole idea before we'd even started.

Then there was the instruction to fold stiffly beaten egg whites into the some sugary, vanillarised egg yolks. Folding is a delicate process that one has to get just right, or you'll end up with a mixture that is either stodgy or not all that mixed at all. I am infamously inept at judging this sort of thing, so naturally I was left in charge of the mixture. In my attempt to avoid the former I erred a little too far towards under-folding, more of a crumple, really, resulting in an omelette that was a little inconsistent. Next time I have to fold something I'll know better. It still looked pretty good in the pan, though.

After slathering it in a good serving of jam and folding it over on itself, we had a dish that looked pretty darn appetising, if I say so myself. Good enough to bait our diners into eating it, anyway. Unfortunately, after tasting it their reactions weren't all that positive, ranging from between "nope" to "well, it's a little like a pancake", and I have to say that I agree. While the texture and consistency were pleasant enough, the lingering egg-ness was a little distracting, and I found myself wishing for a little maple syrup to have with what was for all intents and purposes a milk-less pancake, not really the wow factor that you're aiming for when you've spent so much effort beating all those egg whites. It also just wasn't very much food once split four ways, which would have been a pity if anyone had particularly enjoyed the experience. I'd say this one is really only a recipe for two servings.

We're not totally convinced that we gave the dessert omelette concept a completely fair go given the imperfect folding, so we'll give it another go before we assign this one to the kitchen waste bin of history, though we've promised to do it some night when there's just the two of us so that we don't run the risk of putting anyone else through an ordeal. 

Heck, when there's 366 recipes in the book, they can't all be winners. Hopefully we'll have better luck next week.