Thai omelet with coriander garnish and The Sauce of Life on the side

How often has this happened to you – you get home from work and there is nothing to eat.  Will you suffer the indignity of instant noodles, again?  Order food for delivery and moan with hunger until it arrives? 

I teach cooking classes and sometimes have time to eat and sometimes I don’t.  So I arrived home the other day and opened the refrigerator to find two eggs, some cooked cold rice, a lime and lots of air.  Did I despair?  No.

I made a Thai omelet – it took only five minutes and I ate it with the rice and the blessed naam bplaa prik Sauce of Life (recipe in this blog).  All was well with the world,  A smile returned to my face.  I thought happy thoughts.  I showered and went to bed satisfied.  Life was good.

This traditional Thai omelet is crispy on the sides and light in the middle.  It is not the soft all over European style omelet.  The loads of oil and high heat make the omelet have more texture and the accompanying sauce make is a simple meal to eat with rice, or as a side dish as part of a multi-course Thai meal.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 eggs
• fish sauce, 1 teaspoon / 5 ml
• lime juice, 1 teaspoon / 5 ml
• rice flour, 1 tablespoon / 15 ml (corn starch or potato starch work as well)
• vegetable oil, 3/4 cup / 200 ml (do not use olive oil – it smokes and burns easily and tastes nasty when heated over high heat)
• steamed Thai jasmine rice on a plate ready to serve as a canvas for the omelet
• sauce:  see the recipe in this blog for the quintessential Thai Sauce of Life made of fish sauce, lime juice, finely chopped chillies and sugar to pour over the cooked omelet
• coriander leaf for garnish (optional but it makes the dish look pretty)

All the ingredients you need for a quick and delicious Thai style omelet

 EQUIPMENT

• wok or 10 inch saucepan
• ladle or slotted spoon (helps the oil drain off the cooked omelet)
• mixing bowl – I used one nine inches across and three inches deep so I could really whisk the corn flour into solution with the eggs without it slopping over the sides (use a bowl approximately 23 cm wide and 8 cm deep)
• whisk (helps get the rice flour evenly mixed into the eggs)
• measuring cup for the oil
• measuring spoons for the fish sauce, lime juice and rice flour
• plate for the rice
• spoon to eat the food
• an apron in case any oil splatters on you

METHOD

1. Place your cooked rice on a plate.
2. Crack two fresh eggs into the mixing bowl. Crack the eggs on flat surface and then break into the bowl – if there are any contaminants on the outside of the egg, this trick lessens the chance they will mix in with the egg white and yolk. 
3. Add the fish sauce and lime juice.
4. Whisk the eggs, fish sauce and lime juice until they are well mixed.
5. Sprinkle the rice flour over the liquid contents in the bowl and whisk with vigor until the dry rice flour is absorbed – keep on doing this to eliminate any lumps of dried rice flour as these lumps will taste dry and chalky on your tongue.
6. Heat the wok over high heat for 1 minute.
7. Add the oil and let the oil heat until it is smoking.  The oil must be very hot so the omelet puffs up, so be patient.  In my wok it took two minutes for the oil to heat until it was smoking – your stove and wok may produce a different result, so seeing the smoke is a better measure than time.
8. Once the oil is smoking, pour the egg mixture into the hot oil in the center of the wok.  It will immediately start to sizzle. 
9. Wait 25 seconds as the omelet cooks in the oil.
10. Deftly flip the omelet with a spatula or slotted spoon and wait another 25 seconds. 
11. Remove the omelet from the oil and give it a shake to help any excess oil drip back into the wok or saucepan.
12. Place the cooked omelet on top of the jasmine rice and serve with some spoons of the Sauce of Life (fish sauce mixed with lime juice, finely chopped chillies and sugar – the recipe for this is in this Blog).

Note:  You can drain and strain the excess oil out of the wok and reserve for use in frying something else.