Spanish Omelet

Tortilla de patatas

How to cook a real and delicious Spanish omelet, also know as potatoes omelet

Spanish Omelet
Characteristics
Ingredients
Preparation
A bit of history
Useful links

Spanish Omelet

Along with paella, the ubiquitous Spanish omelette - tortilla de patatas - is perhaps one of the best-known Spanish dishes. It is impossible to find a self-respecting tapas bar that does not feature tortilla in its repertoire.

As delicious as it is versatile, this Spanish staple lends itself to countless variations according to personal taste. Some cooks mix in mushrooms, green pepers, cod, etc.,While others choose to omit the onion and instead cover the tortilla in tomato sauce. Others still would never dream of serving the tortilla without heaping mounds of mayonnaise. Each region, and each tapas bar, will have its own variation of the traditional tortilla. This delicious tapa can be served warm or cold. But the most popular it is the one with poatoes and onions.

Characteristics

Serves: 4
Difficulty: Very easy
Preparation time: 35 minutes

Ingredients

1/2 pint of olive oil
5 medium (40 oz each) baking potatoes, peeled, sliced

and lightly sprinkled with salt

1/2 yellow onion, chopped
5 eggs
Salt

Preparation

Heat the olive oil in a 9-inch skillet and add the potato slices carefully, because the salt will make the oil splatter. You can add first the potatoes and the the salt, so you would avoid the oil splatter.Try to keep the potato slices separated so they will not stick together. Add them slowly, then you will keep the oil warm and the potatoes will not stick one each other. Cook, turning occasionally, over medium heat for 5 minutes. Add the onions and cook until the potatoes are tender. Drain into a colander, leaving about 3 tablespoons of oil in the skillet.

Meanwhile, in a large bowl, whisk the eggs with a pinch of salt. Add the potatoes, and stir to coat with the egg. Add the egg-coated potatoes to the very hot oil in the skillet, spreading them evenly to completely cover the base of the skillet. Lower the heat to medium and continue to cook, shaking the pan frequently, until mixture is half set.

Use a plate to cover the skillet and invert the omelette away from the hand holding the plate (so as not to burn your hand with any escaping oil). Add 1 tablespoon oil to the pan and slide the omelette back into the skillet on its uncooked side. Cook until completely set. Depending on the time you cook the omelete on each side, the inside more or less juicy. Personally if you leave it a bit juicy tastes much better.

Allow the omelette to cool, and then cut it into wedges. Season it with salt and sprinkle with lemon juice to taste (optional).

Serve warm or at room temperature.

A bit of history

The first news of potatoes, found in the New World, were taken into Spain in the year 1516 through Pedro Martir of Anghiera, from Milan, who was chronicler of the Catholic Monarchs, but they were men of Pizarro which met in 1532 when explored Cajamarca in northern Peru.

It is likely that the first potatoes arrived in Spain at the hands of Pedro Cieza de Leon. They were presented to Charles I and some copies were sent to Pope Julius II as a botanical curiosity is not the case and recounting the vicissitudes that these copies were fulfilling an important role in disseminating this solanácea in Europe.

There is no doubt that the Spaniards were the first to cultivate potatoes in Europe with utilitarian purposes, as can be seen in various documents that it credited, for example, we know that in the year 1575 that Regent Hospital Brotherhood of Charity of Seville passing through any economic difficulties and the council of any of the returnees Indians, the brothers used potatoes to be grown in some inheritances on the shores of Betis to feed the sick, getting a good acceptance by them.

Given the success it was decided to plant orchards in these Solanaceae convent. On December 19, 1577, Mother Teresa of Avila since Jesus sent a letter to the prioress of the convent del Carmen, in Seville, thank you for a few potatoes and some fruslerías that he had been sent.

These facts and that could include some more, show that these dates already existed in Andalusia patatares very previous to which the Irish JT Dillon says it has seen in Galicia in 1789 and even those who in 1736 denounced the pastor of Santiago de Braves in the province of Lugo.

Are unknown the place and the date it was cooked for the first time a potato omelette, but it is quite possible that arose between the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries anywhere today ignored that the same could be in the modest home of a peasant Andalusian that a meal of fortune by trajinantes or soldiers in a sale by the wayside as those who knew the misfortunes of engineering Hidalgo.

We ate for the first time in the refectory of a convent, or was invented by the cook of a noble house, was born in or stay of a Creole lady in the Peruvian distant lands, as a dish as simple, unpretentious, which can be eaten hot or cold, well suited for the muleteers pitanza the lead in the cyclebag adrales hanging from the loins of the trolley or the mule crossing, near the dark brown loaf, a dry piece of cheese ovejuno and a zaque vinatero.

Whatever its origin, tortilla de patatas strongly rooted in Spanish life.

Our tortilla potatoes should always be round, yellow and splendorous as the solar disc, admits in her womb without losing the authenticity of the marriage onion and sometimes, with real success, a blade of escabeche bonito.

But his greatest grace was conferred the abundance of egg and be well curd, fleeing the consistency of the slug that some like, but that makes it to detract from their real addicts, as the Spanish omelet should be compact and Prieto, which allow the appetizing kept for a couple of days.

For some commentators have said that the potato omelette, universally known as "Spanish Tortilla," was well known in Navarra when battling against the Napoleonic armies and states Jose M ª Iribarren who so anonymous test a memorial in which there was talk of feed the troops in the year 1817 which was filed with the courts in Pamplona.

Other authors confirm that this type of tortilla dish was customary in these lands during the first Carlist War (1833-1840) and that on one occasion in a meal campaign, he was offered a tortilla de patatas al Carlist general Zumalacárregui.