Braised Omelets

Here's another dish full of Chinese concepts, but that has drifted with some western influences. It's sort of like an egg fu yung, but this is a rolled omelet and not so greasy. This is also a better knife and fork meal than a chopstick one.

I'm using pictures from a couple of different meals in this style. One is more mushroom and cabbage based, the other zucchini and char shu based.  If the picture is fuzzy, it's from the mushroom meal most likely. Something was up with the camera that day.

Make a batch of egg omelette crepes. Figure an egg per person you're cooking for. Each egg makes about 2 1/3 crepes when cooked in an 8" nonstick skillet. This gives you a few extra crepes for mistakes as needed.

Season as you like, I recommend a little salt or maybe some adobo seasoning, some sriracha and sesame oil. Beat to combine well.

Heat an 8" nonstick skillet over medium heat. Spray LIGHTLY with nonstick spray.

Pour in about half an egg's worth of the egg mixture, about 1 1/2 to two tablespoons.

Tilt the skillet to coat the bottom of the pan evenly

When it just looks moist on top, it's ready flip. Notice also that the very edges have dried and curled away from the pan a bit.

They're too light to reliably flip with a pan toss. Slip a silicone rubber spatula under the omelet, lift, flip and straighten it out.

Don't sweat the small tears. They'll work fine. You'll break some occasionally. That's OK. Some can be salvaged, others you'll just have to slice up for the filling.

Here's a good one. Usually the first or second one are more prone to break because the pan isn't evenly hot and slick as it will get when fully hot. After the first two, I usually turn the heat down a bit as well.

Set them aside to be filled.

Filling can be most any combination. Dried mushrooms are pretty common as are bean sprouts. Something green like cabbage, some onion. Meat often shows up too. Ham, char shu, chicken, chopped shrimp. Figure about 1/3 cup of cooked filling per egg.

 On the left, I have carrots, onion, ginger, garlic, egg crepes, zucchini and some char shu. On the right, I have mushrooms, carrots, onions, cabbage and bean sprouts that were cooked in batches as shown, then combined, seasoning as desired and for contrast with the other ingredients.

Cook the filling. I cooked the carrots and onion with some ginger, salt and pepper. And the zucchini separately with garlic and a touch of light soy. I combined them, then added the char shu to heat through.

For the mushroom batch, I cooked the mushrooms more slowly to draw out their moisture and deepen their flavors.

Lay on 2-3 tablespoons of filling per crepe.

Roll it up. The trick is to make it snug, but not so tight that the crepe tears. A tear is not the end of the world, especially for a family meal. If you're making this for guests where presentation counts more, you should make more egg crepes than you think you'll need to ensure perfect crepes for each guest. Keep them seam down to help hold them together.

I'll include a broken one just to show that it can work out well enough for you. What a terribly focused picture, I apologize.

Lay the completed rolls into a 12" nonstick skillet. Put the broken one in amongst the good ones to help hold it together.

Build a basic garlic sauce. This will make about 1 cup, enough to lightly sauce 10-12 crepes.

1 clove garlic minced
1/2 teaspoon ginger, minced--optional
1/2 teaspoon oil
3/4 cup chicken stock--low sodium preferred
1 teaspoon light soy
1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
2 teaspoons shao hsing wine
2 tablespoons oyster sauce
2-3 teaspoons corn starch--use more or less to adjust thickness as desired.

Combine the stock, soy, sesame oil,  rice wine, oyster sauce and corn starch. Mix well.

Heat a small pan over medium heat. Add the oil, then garlic and ginger if using. Stir fry until aromatic.

Give your liquid a final stir to remix any settled corn starch and add to the cooking garlic.

Stir and bring to a boil to thicken. The sauce will turn from cloudy to translucent and glassy.

Pour over and around your filled omelets.

Simmer the omelets gently in the sauce until warmed thoroughly and the sauce has coated the omelets. Serve immediately.  Two makes a nice sized serving.