Week 41 - Omelettes

The Week 41 challenge theme was omelettes. Omelettes and scrambles aren't uncommon in our kitchen, and I even made an omelette for the very first 52 week challenge week I participated in. For this challenge, I decided to do a Western omelette, since it was a type of omelette I've always liked but have never made. The typical Western omelette has ham, onion, and green bell pepper mixed in, and sometimes cheddar cheese. I decided to use all of those and serve it with a side of potato tots (also used in a previous challenge) and on a bed of arugula.

For omelettes for 2 (plus sides), I used:

- 4 eggs ($1.33)

- 5 slices of Canadian bacon ($1.25)

- 1 red onion ($0.29)

- 1 green bell pepper ($0.47)

- 1 cup of grated cheddar cheese ($1.37)

- 1/2 bag of TJ's potato tots ($1.15)

- 1/2 bag of TJ's arugula ($1)

I'm not sure why Trader Joe's (or at least our local store) doesn't carry ham in any form other than slices. They had 2 cold cut style ham packages that were sliced really thin, and then this Canadian bacon, which was thicker slices, and that was it. I got the Canadian bacon, which worked fine after cutting it up, but I'm not sure why they don't have regular ham. As far as taste goes, the Canadian bacon was basically what I wanted anyway.

The total cost of our omelette dinner was $6.86. I'm not sure if you can get a single omelette at a restaurant for that price, so it was a pretty affordable dinner. Quite pleased with that price for dinner for 2, all from scratch other than the tots.

Making the omelettes was easy. Chop up the onion, pepper, and ham. Cook it together in a skillet until everything is cooked through, and then set aside. Grate the cheese. Mix up the eggs for the omelettes into 2 equal bowls of 2 eggs each. Once all that was done, I made each omelette in the skillet with 2 eggs and half the filling.

The first omelette didn't come out as well as I had hoped. One side was way too thin and completely broke up when I tried to get it off the pan to fold it over. That was disappointing.

The second one came out a little bit better, but still not as good as some omelettes I've made in the past. I think I should have used our smaller pan to do these but now I know for next time. I added the cheese shortly before folding them over, if you're wondering.

I followed the instructions on the bag for the tots, which involved baking them in the oven for about 20 minutes, moving them around halfway through. We love potato tots, so we're always happy to have these for dinner. They're crispy on the outside but nice and soft on the inside, not too greasy, and they have good potato flavor.

Overall, it was a good dinner. We really liked the flavors of the omelette. There's a reason why Western omelettes are so popular. The combination of ham, onion, and peppers together with cheddar cheese is just a winning combination. We were especially happy with the cheddar cheese. We usually buy the pre-shredded bags of cheese for convenience, but I decided to try grating our own from a block of Wisconsin mild cheddar this time. It definitely made a difference. So much better. We also added some green dragon hot sauce (post coming soon) to the tots and the omelette. The omelette didn't necessarily need the hot sauce, as it was good without it, but it was tasty with it too. I would definitely make this omelette again.

As for the usual evaluation of Trader Joe's products that we do in our product reviews, buy again? Yes, for both the potato tots (which was already a repeat purchase here) and the Wisconsin mild cheddar (first time buy, but we were instantly fans). Definitely yes.