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Comment by tptacek | Hacker News Reader

I can't believe I didn't know about Spanish tortilla before. Easily the best egg dish and also maybe the best way I currently know to prepare potatoes at home now. And they get better when they're cold! I've wasted my life!

I've made dozens since last summer, and Kenji's technique in the video has been pretty much bulletproof for me.

His extra-creamy scrambled egg is also a mainstay now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uX-Y513ohbc --- I love how little patience he has with macho restaurant culture, and that he won't even link to Gordon Ramsay, who popularized the dish.

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I've made his Spanish tortilla once a month or so since that video came out... However, I once dropped the whole thing in the sink while doing the "flip". (Maneuvering a hot cast iron pan isn't easy.) I've never felt more disappointed in myself than I did at that moment; I was making it for breakfast and I basically just turned the stove off and went back to bed. So now I'm always a bit wary when I start on it, knowing that it has the power to destroy me psychologically.

This has happened to me a few times, and I imagine many others!

I bought a “tortilla pan” in Spain which prevents this. It’s basically two pans with an interlock on one side. You cook the tortilla on one side, grab the other pan and lock it on, then flip it over and put the other pan on the heat to cook the other side. Foolproof and worth it when you cook as many as I do!

I am very surprised it's not a more popular dish in the US - it seems like it would fit well the Denny's, IHOPs or even some fast-breakfast drive-throughs, and work as breakfast or appetizer or dinner.

It's on every menu in Barcelona - yes, served cold.

A Spaniard taught me that mixing in some potato chips gives it some variety. He said he even sometimes makes it completely out of packaged chips.

The potato chip Spanish tortilla is supposedly a Ferran Adria thing.

It’s in his cookbook “The Family Meal”.

It is a curious and useful book: the recipes are for the unfussy Spanish homestyle meals they served to the staff at el Bulli each night before opening. Each recipe is one that can scale way up, and the quantities are given to make each dish For 2, 6, 20, or 75 (!) people. It’s a good source of inspiration if you need to cook a dish for a crowd.

There are also detailed photo illustrations of the ingredients and of each step in the recipe.

Huh, it's weird, I have The Family Meal, and even remember reading the potato chip omelette thing, but never connected that to a Spanish tortilla.

Just as a point of order (and because I don't like giving Gordon Ramsay credit for things either), Jaques Pépin popularized that technique for scrambled eggs when Ramsay was ten years old.

He remains a delight to watch!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqKq0bQHnZU

I've watched this Jacques Pépin video countless times and the ease with which he casually prepares the two styles of omelets in ~5 minutes and narrates the process amazes me every time. I still can't perfectly replicate the second "classic French omelet" style even after years of effort. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1XoCQm5JSQ&t=8s

That video is amazing and taught me how to make omelets. Of course, Pépin is also responsible for the single greatest cooking video on the Internet:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfY0lrdXar8

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