Best Spanish Omelette Recipe

Looking for an easy and delicious Spanish omelette recipe? You've come to the right place! This recipe is perfect for a quick weeknight dinner, or a weekend brunch. Plus, it's made with simple ingredients that you probably already have in your pantry.

Jump to Recipe - Print Recipe

The Tortilla Española, called tortilla de patatas and some call Spanish Frittata, is a very well-known one, some may say it is Spain's national dish. Everybody likes it or used to like it, in case they are entirely vegan.

We all have tried super dry or flavorless Spanish Omelettes that do not compare to the moist and flavorful ones.

Ingredients

• Organic eggs
• Waxy potatoes
• Onion
• Salt and pepper
• Rosemary sprig
• Good quality olive oil

See quantities and full instructions in the recipe card.

Instructions

To make this Tortilla de Patatas, as this recipe is traditionally called in Spain, follow these simple steps.

• Wash, clean, peel, and crack the potatoes roughly so they have irregular borders. It will take you about five minutes. You can also make potato slices, but we prefer them to be rustic. Sliced potatoes make a layered potato omelette.
• Dice the onion and add it to the potatoes in a large bowl with salt (you can choose not to add the onion). It is essential to add the salt at this point, so the potatoes and onions are well seasoned and lose the excess water.
• Drain potatoes. Remove excess water from the potato mixture using a colander.
• Heat oil. Pour olive oil into a large frying pan, on medium heat.
• Fry potatoes. Add potatoes and onion mixture into the oil, stirring occasionally with a slotted spoon to avoid it sticking to the bottom, and spread the heat evenly.
• Elevate the temperature to medium-high heat. When you can see that the potato is soft and cooked, turn the heat up, and keep stirring, so the potato borders get a crunchy edge.
• Add the rosemary spring to the oil. This is optional as the traditional Spanish omelette doesn't call for rosemary, but it adds a nice touch.
• Crack eggs. Meanwhile, crack four eggs in a big heat-resistant bowl (don’t beat eggs).
• Remove the cooked potatoes from heat as soon as they look golden brown. Pick them out of the oil, drain the excess oil with a strainer, and add potato and onion on top of the unbeaten eggs.
• Stir the mix; you will note that the eggs start to cook a bit. You need a creamy dripping texture so feel free to add another one or two eggs if you don’t have a slightly thick and fluid mix.
• Prepare a skillet. Take a skillet and add 4-5 tablespoons of the oil and turn the heat up.
• Carefully add the egg mixture and let it form a crust on the bottom. With a rubber spatula, separate the egg mixture from the edges.
• When it looks halfway cooked, put a clean plate on top of the potato omelet and carefully turn it upside down.
• Immediately slide the omelette again back into the skillet, and let be slowly cooked for another 2-3 minutes.
• When it is completely cooked carefully slide the Spanish tortilla out of the skillet into the serving plate.

Serve with crusty bread at room temperature. We like using our easy loaf recipe.

Characteristics a Spanish Tortilla is supposed to meet

• A Spanish Omelette has to be gooey at its core.
• It is not supposed to include onions in its more basic version.
• This Spanish dish has to be made with extra virgin olive oil.

I took the liberty to make these three minimal variations to the traditional recipe, which have made my guests crazy over the years. In my opinion, this version is truly a winner!

Tips for a Fantastic Tortilla

The 3 things that I changed I have learned from Spanish friends who all agree that they also did things differently in every house in Spain, so I don’t feel that I am cheating on the traditional recipe.

The Gooey Center

We prefer a firmer Omelette. I cook it just a little more, about ¾. I learned to appreciate the different textures and flavor profiles from a yolk, and I have enjoyed it also in poached eggs, Benedict eggs, and even at home; when I was a little boy, we would always be offered the option for a soft or well-cooked egg.

As we became plant-based with a few exceptions like Tortilla Española now and then, our tastebuds started to avoid yolky flavors and textures that reminded us of eggs.

So we’ve tried this ¾ cooked version for a few years, and it always delivers as much flavor as the original one, and it also pleases many more palates that also dislike gooey yolks.

Using Onions

A simple reason here. I feel onions provide an extra punch to the flavor that we all may agree with. The key here is not to overdo the quantity. You want an oniony taste, not an onion omelette.

Rosemary

Add rosemary to the frying oil. I think this extra herbal note makes it outstanding and memorable. It is the secret to making your Tortilla Española Your signature. The delicate flavor it adds to the dish makes this version so good that it is the only dish that makes us still have eggs once in a while.

Jump to Recipe

Wine Pairing

It is in the Wine Culture where you will genuinely find quality wines and support sustainability. For this reason, in this blog, when we recommend wines, we do not want you to go to a supermarket shelf to buy wines for the usual varietals resulting from monoculture. Instead, we recommend wines taking you to the places where they come from. Thus, we advocate for living wines, with Culture, with Terroir.

We are challenged to find harmonies for an egg-based dish. It is not a very complex challenge. However, the egg directly rules out a wide range of wines to choose from, basically any young wine, white, rosé, or red.

The reason is straightforward; the egg is an umami food, that is to say, a food that is intensely perceived with the fifth flavor, umami, or as I like to call it, tasty.

How to do Wine Pairing with Umami Foods

Umami foods fill the mouth with a long lingering flavor. Unfortunately, this makes many wines overshadowed by umami foods. The solution is to choose wines that also develop the umami flavor.

Its aging gives the development of the umami quality in a bottle of wine, which we call oenological slang oxidative aging.

The caramelization that occurs during this aging - in chemistry, called the Maillard effect - will be much more intense the more alcohol the wine has.

Now, this does not mean that our Spanish omelette needs an alcoholic wine. It means that it requires a robust wine with body and persistence in the mouth.

Typically, when you order a Spanish omelette at your favorite tapas restaurant, you continue to drink the light-bodied wine that goes well with everything else on your table. And I suspect that that sip of wine that follows your bite is almost always a disappointment.

So how do we solve the puzzle?

I will make two pairing suggestions that will surely help you enjoy the harmonies between the egg and the wine much more, one for red wine and another for white wine.

Two Recommended Wine Pairings

When choosing wines, if you live in a producing area, always choose local, find out about your producers, the history of your location, and the winemaking practices, and explore all the styles available in your area.

If you do not live in a producing area (or close to one of them), support the specialized stores near you, just as you would support your local farmers' market. Talk to the specialists, and ask them about their wine's selection, the wine's origins, their production practices, and the reasons that led to their inclusion in their selection.

With wine, as with any food on our table, it is always good to think about the path it went through before reaching us. It is also essential to consider the kilometers and the means of transportation used. Be aware of the carbon footprint of the food and wine you consume, and you will make your small contribution to sustainability.

As our recipe uses extra-virgin olive oil infused with rosemary.

My first recommendation is a red made with Grenache, a Gigondas from the South of the Rhône. These wines are very similar to the more famous Chateauneuf du Pape.

They are also made with many autochthonous varieties, always led by the Grenache, but the Gigondas are more accessible to drink young without losing strength and flavor. If you can choose a bottle at three or four years of age in relation to the most recent vintage, you will have a better harmony.

My second recommendation is the wine that goes perfectly with the Spanish omelette. If you go to a good Spanish tapas restaurant, you can likely order it to accompany all your tapas: a sherry Palo Cortado style wine.

The Sherry Wines

Sherry wines are wines fortified with wine alcohol and which are aged for long periods in wooden barrels.

We are talking about a complex elaboration that involves microclimates in the cellar, mixing different grape years, yeast veils, and many other fascinating details that provide all the nuances in the diversity of sherry wines.

The Palo Cortado is a sherry wine to which enough alcohol is added to prevent the formation of a yeast veil that protects it from oxygen, making this wine suffer forceful oxidative aging, which amounts to premature aging.

As it is a wine with a high alcohol content - around 18% vol. - the caramelization it develops is extraordinary, which makes it perfect to pair with umami flavors.

And it also makes it perfect for our very tasty egg, potatoes, and onions recipe!

Don't forget to try another exquisite Spanish dish: the famous Escalivada along with its Wine Pairing!

Wine Pairing Recap

• France - Red - Grenache Blend - Gigondas (South of Rhone)
• Spain - Dry Sherry - Palo Cortado

If you try this recipe, let us know! Leave a comment, rate it, and don't forget to tag a photo #ourplantbasedworld on Instagram. Cheers!

Food safety

We sometimes take for granted that we have years (or decades) of cooking experience that the average visitor may not. Add to, or remove from, the list below with health and safety tips.

• Cook to a minimum temperature of 165 °F (74 °C)
• Do not use the same utensils on cooked food that previously touched raw meat
• Wash hands after touching raw meat
• Don't leave food sitting out at room temperature for extended periods
• Never leave cooking food unattended
• Use oils with high smoking points to avoid harmful compounds
• Always have good ventilation when using a gas stove

See more guidelines at USDA.gov.

The information shown is an estimate provided by an online nutrition calculator. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist's advice. See our full Nutritional Disclosure here.

Please note that some of the links here are affiliate links, and I will earn a commission if you purchase through those links. I use all of the products listed and recommend them because they are companies that I have found helpful and trustworthy.