A cracking omelette challenge!

04 August 2016

This year, on Food Revolution Day, Jamie launched a competition to find your best twist on his simple cheese omelette recipe. It’s a humble, healthy, easy to whip up at home dish, open to all manner of variations and a great way to showcase a bit of culinary imagination!

OUR WINNER!

Maartje Van Ours is a Dutch entrant who lives in Berlin. Her recipe was selected for its simplicity and creativity – using bitter sweet fennel, punchy cheese and fresh herbs. Delicious! She explains her food background below, and shares the inspiration for her winning omelette, pictured above as shot by the Jamie magazine team!

We’ll also be profiling five of our favourite runner-up ‘omeleteers’ over the next few days, too.

Jamie’s Top ‘Omeleteer’ – Maartje Van Ours

“I grew up in a small village in the south west of The Netherlands with my parents, two sisters, and brother. Our house had a big kitchen garden and, for dinner, we would go into the garden to get herbs, beans, carrots, courgettes or whatever was in season. Eggs came from our own chickens, and we bought milk directly from the farmer – pouring it into the cans we took ourselves. We hardly ate any meat, but sometimes had fish. From the age of 12, my parents encouraged me to prepare dinner once every fortnight for the whole family.

Feeding the next generation

My childhood is the reason I know it’s so important to educate our children about food and where it comes from. A good knowledge of food will benefit children for their whole lives, and they in turn will be able to pass that knowledge on to their future families.

My children are growing up in the city and we don’t have the space to grow a lot of vegetables and fruit, which means we have to turn to other resources. Luckily, in Berlin lots of grocery stores do a great job selling seasonal and regional products, and there are also plenty of farmers’ markets selling produce that was picked just a day ago.

Urban gardening

This summer, we have built wooden boxes in our city garden, to teach our girls about food and to grow some of our own vegetables. It’s fantastic to see how excited they get; seeing a tomato slowly turn red, finding a ripe strawberry, or trying to comprehend that the seed we put in the soil has turned into a radish! They often help me in the kitchen, starting with choosing the vegetables at the market, cutting the ‘easy’ veg, and finishing with eating their own cooked meal. We also use the kitchen for a good baking session or decorating our own pizzas.

My winning omelette

The girls eat a hot lunch at school, which often includes meat and carbs. So the emphasis for our evening meals is on vegetables. I have a whole range of favourite meals that are easy to pack with seasonal vegetables. My omelette is one of those recipes.

As well as being better for the environment and your health, eating seasonally really helps to keep children interested in their food. They love the variation as our diet changes throughout the year. They can’t stop eating strawberries when they’re in season, but lose their interest after two months. So it’s great news that after the strawberries come the peaches, cherries and berries, which get them excited all over again each month!”

Follow Maartje on Instagram for more brilliant food photos and inspiration @foodformygirls.