A New Favorite Omelet

I may be a bestselling cookbook author and all, but I'm still one of you. Not just because I eat low carb -- I've got the same chores and the same worries. Which is why I spent Sunday defrosting my freezer. Well, one of my freezers; I have two. Somehow the one in the garage had not sealed well in this humid summer weather, and it had inches of frost, and even icicles!

(Because it's in the garage, and I didn't care about water on the floor, this was the easiest defrosting ever. I just stuffed all the food into coolers, unplugged the sucker, and left the door open. When it was thoroughly melted, I sponged out what water was left. Voila!)

But you know how it is when you defrost. You find all sorts of bits of food you forgot about, or don't even really know where they came from, and that don't really fit into your current menu plans. Still, you hate to just stuff them back in the freezer to age for another umpteen months. And you really, really hate to throw them away, 'cause food is expensive, especially good food.

All of which by way of explaining how I ended up thinking of ways to use up most of a package of salami in the past couple of days. I'm not even sure I bought the salami in question -- it may have been lurking in there since a friend house-sat last summer. It looked hopelessly freezer-burned, but when I thawed it out it turned out to be fine. So there I was, with three-quarters of a package of perfectly good salami. I couldn't put it back in the freezer; refreezing things is a no-no. And you know I wasn't making it into sandwiches! I could have slivered it up in a salad with Italian dressing, and I may do that with some of it.

But being me, I turned to my standby for using up odd bits of food -- the omelet. And it was so good, I made it again for breakfast today, and may even buy more salami in the future for the same purpose!

Here's what I did:

I put my 9" non-stick skillet over medium-low heat and added about a tablespoon of olive oil. I crushed a teeny clove of garlic (if you only have big cloves, use half) and threw it in the oil with about 1/4 teaspoon Italian seasoning.

While those things were flavoring the oil I cracked a couple of eggs and scrambled 'em up. Then I turned up the heat (don't start with it high, you'll burn your garlic and it will be nasty!) and dumped in the eggs.

I did my usual lifting-the-edges-to-let-the-raw-egg-run-underneath thing. When there wasn't enough egg left to run, I turned the burner to the lowest setting. I tore a couple of slices of salami in half and laid them over half the egg disk. Topped it with a good handful of shredded mozzarella. Then I covered it and let it sit for a few minutes, till the cheese melted. Then I folded it and ate it.

Yum! So simple, but so good. If you love Italian food, you need to try this. A tablespoon of warmed pizza sauce would be good on top of this, but would add a few carbs. And this is wonderful as-is.

Salami and Mozzarella Omelet: One serving, with 427 Calories; 36g Fat ; 22g Protein; 3g Carbohydrate; trace Dietary Fiber

Try it!