Salacious Salad and Omelette

Sometime last year I came across a post on /r/food that I seem to be unable to dig up. However, I recall that it had an infographic asserting that for a salad to be perfect, it had to have

• something tangy,
• something sweet,
• something crunchy,
• some protein (egg or meat),
• some dairy (yoghurt or cheese).

So I goofed around preparing breakfast one Sunday morning, and out came this.

Ingredients

Amounts are per person. Multiply as needed.

Salad:

• A fistful of rocket leaves (arugula).
• Some grapes, the smaller the better.
• A few cherry tomatoes. Best fresh off the vine in the middle of summer, even better if you can mix red, yellow, and purple varieties.
• A few basil leaves.
• A small amount of your favorite cold cut, say a thin slice or two of prosciutto crudo or bresaola (or Bündnerfleisch, if you want to get super fancy).
• A few thin slices of Parmigiano or Grana Padano. Cutting them off the piece with a potato peeler works really well.
• Pinch of black sesame seeds.

Vinaigrette:

• 1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
• Pinch of salt
• A few turns of freshly ground black pepper
• Half a teaspoon of mustard
• Half a teaspoon of honey
• A dash of something spicy, if you’re into that sort of thing. Sambal oelek or sriracha sauce will work just fine.
• 3 teaspoons olive oil

Omelette:

• 1 egg
• Pinch of salt
• Butter (for frying)

Equipment

• 1 medium-size bowl
• 2 small bowls
• Whisk
• Small frying pan

Method

1. Prepare the tomatoes: using a properly sharp kitchen knife, cut them into halves, quarters, or slices. Chuck them into a small bowl and sprinkle them rather liberally with salt and black pepper. Stack the basil leaves on top of each other and roll them up like tobacco leaves for a cigar, then cut the rolls into slices as thinly as you can. Throw the thin basil strands into the bowl, add some olive oil, and mix thoroughly using a spoon or your hands. Let the bowl sit on the countertop for five minutes or so, so that the tomatoes start oozing a bit of juice.

2. Make the vinaigrette: in a wide-enough bowl, put in salt, pepper, mustard, honey, and balsamic vinegar, and optionally the spicy condiment. Whisk to mix nicely, then add olive oil and whisk vigorously for 30-60 seconds. The goal is to get an opaque emulsion, with the mustard and honey acting as natural emulsifiers.

3. Throw the rocket leaves and grapes into the vinaigrette bowl and mix thoroughly with (cleanly washed) hands. Let sit for a few minutes so that the vinaigrette can infuse the leaves.

4. Crack egg into a small bowl, beat thoroughly with the whisk so the mixture is homogenous. Add a bit of salt.

5. Make sure your serving plate, pieces of meat, cheese shavings, and black sesame are close by (if you’re a mise-en-place enthusiast, you’ve likely done this already) — once the omelette is ready, you want to serve things up quickly.

6. Heat up some butter in the small pan.

7. Pour the beaten egg in and cook your omelet. It will be very thin so this should take only a minute, perhaps two.

8. Throw the omelet on the plate (don’t fold it) and then start stacking: rocket and grapes in vinaigrette at the bottom, then tomatoes in olive oil and basil, meat, cheese shavings finally sesame on top.

9. Serve.

Nutrition facts

No warranty of any kind on these. Values are per serving.

Calories (kcal)	343
Total fat (g)	28.1
Saturated fat (g)	8.8
Total carbohydrates (g)	12.1
Sugars (g)	8.2
Protein (g)	12.9