The omelet of life!

Saturday morning… family breakfast! And this morning it was omelet on the menu. The big man is home…

And as I am making the omelet’s it makes me think about life… for the perfect omelet is made from the right ingredients being put into the hot pan at the right time. For us, the Mortimer omelet is made simply; just 5 main ingredients and the seasoning.

The pan has to be hot and the coconut oil just running clear and hot.

Throw in the red onion…. And let them sweat until they are clear, but not fully cooked nor brown or burnt…

Throw in the finely sliced button mushrooms… and let them brown and shrink. You always need more mushrooms than you originally think…

Once they are nicely soft it is the turn of the spinach… Again, more than you think as the leaves reduce to practically nothing…

And quickly after the spinach, the eggs, pre-whisked and seasoned…

Then comes the patience… a few swirls of the spatula around the pan to ensure it doesn’t stick…

Waiting for the perfect time to overlay the fatless palma ham to be laid on top…

Patience… you don’t want to flip the omelet too early or the egg will run out the side and spoil the perfect half crescent shape… too long and you get a rubbery texture.

I do this routine 4 times… as I have 4 hungry men at my breakfast table.

As I repeat the recipe and activity the 4 times, it makes me think of the recipe of life….

Just like life – we may know what we want the outcome to be and the steps we need to take and decisions we need to make… but it could go wrong. Outside influences could deter us from our path, make us shift our focus… A spilt glass of water could make us burn the onions… and we have to start again.. Just as in life, a life event could make us take our eye off the prize and we have to start over…

Just like life – everyone is different… the goal different, the size of the goal different…. Tom – 1 egg, Willy 2 eggs, Uncle Barny 3 eggs and Big Daddy Morts the 4 full egg breakfast.   The same applies with the ingredients… Tom doesn’t like mushrooms and BDM wants extra spinach…

Just like life – you need patience… If you want the end result to be as good as it possibly can be or even exceed your expectations, you need to have patience to go through each step before moving to the next one… Rush it and it can all go wrong. Scrambled egg.

Just like life – you need the right tools… BDM has worked out that the 5 inch pan is the perfect size…. That a plastic spatula is the best thing to do the swirling and flipping.   The mini whisk with the red bowl … god forbid they go missing! It never feels right if you have to do it with a fork and a breakfast bowl…

Just like life – you can’t take short cuts….. the youtube clip of the omelet in a ziplock bag and boiling water. Rubbertastic! No thanks…

Just like life – everyone can take a different approach and still get the same brilliant result. Mr OCD stays true to himself… the onions chopped into tiny perfect squares, next to the perfectly sliced onions in perfect piles, spinach out and the palma ham de-fatted, the eggs whisked in the red bowl, seasoned… perfectly lined up, cup of coffee next to the pan. And…. Go!

Me… I am a muddle of chopping just in time, walking back and forth to the chopping board, swearing as the onions just start to go brown as I search for the spatula… can’t find the spinach in the fridge… you get the picture….

But the end result is that the omelet is done, delicious and nutritious…

Just like life… you can look at the end result and know that reversing the order, connecting the dots backwards, each step played a part in the perfect breakfast plate, the perfect result for our lives. Each step or dot, necessary for us to move to the next dot and we remain at some dots longer than others, entirely because it is necessary…

Steve Jobs was right.