Here's the recipe...
Culinary craziness has reached new heights in New
York with the debut of the $1,000 omelet!
Le Parker Meridien hotel on W. 57th St. recently
added the bank-breaking breakfast dish to its menu,
charging patrons what it costs to buy about 200 omelets
at your local greasy spoon.
But the so-called Zillion Dollar Frittata is
apparently no ordinary omelet, consisting, as it does,
of a mix of eggs, lobster and lots of caviar. It's so
exclusive, so spectacular and so expensive that ...
nobody's ordered one yet.
"Every six months we come up with new dishes for the
menu," said Steven Pipes, the hotel's general manager.
"We don't like things to get stale."
For penny pinchers, Norma's, the restaurant in Le
Parker Meridien, offers an economy version of the
frittata, a crustless quiche that contains 1 ounce of
sevruga caviar.
It costs $100.
The supersize version of the frittata boasts 10
ounces of the pricey caviar. Along with its $1,000 price
tag comes a written challenge on the menu: "Norma dares
you to expense this."
As with several other menu items, the frittata is
highlighted in red ink as one of "Norma's
recommendations."
When Pipes and Norma's executive chef, Emile
Castillo, decided to incorporate caviar into a frittata,
they knew it would be a costly proposition. They pay $65
an ounce for sevruga.
"We priced it out and realized we'd have to charge
$100 for the regular frittata," Pipes said.
"Since we knew it was going to be a very expensive
dish, we decided to have some fun with it," he added.
"If someone really wants to splurge, we gave them a
$1,000 option. It's not just a gimmick, though. It
tastes good."
Since the deluxe lobster-and-fish-egg frittata
appeared on the menu on May 5, not one customer has
taken the bait for either the $100 or $1,000 version.
"I couldn't believe it was the price when I first saw
'1,000' on the menu," said Virginia Marnell, 59, of
Greenwich Village. "I thought it was the calorie count.
It's outrageous!"
Patty Zimmerman of San Diego said she and her three
friends were amused by the eggs-treme price tag. "It
made us chuckle," she said. "It's definitely a
conversation starter."
Second-year Fordham Law School student Allison Adler
was breakfasting with her mother, Jackie, from San
Diego.
"It's for people with much deeper pockets and much
larger bank accounts than us," said Adler, whose mom
recommends the lobster and asparagus omelet instead.
At $25, she said, "It's a relative bargain."
Easy ... &
rich
Here's the recipe for the Zillion
Dollar Frittata now offered at Norma's at Le Parker
Meridien hotel.
Ingredients:
6 eggs
1 tbsp. chopped chives
1½ tbsps.
butter
1 lobster
5 tbsps. heavy cream
10 ounces
sevruga
caviar
Directions:
Preheat oven
to 375 degrees.
Place whole lobster in a pot of boiling water. Boil
for one minute, then put lobster in a bath of cold
water. Remove tail from lobster and pry meat from shell,
keeping it whole. Remove meat from claws and chop the
meat. Cut the lobster in half and remove the tomalley,
or liver (that soft, blackish-green stuff in the
stomach).
Heat ½ tablespoon of butter in a small saucepan. Add
heavy cream and bring to a boil. Cook three minutes
while stirring. Strain sauce into a bowl and set
aside.
Break eggs into a bowl. Add chives and half of the
sauce and beat with a fork.
In an omelet pan, heat ½ tablespoon butter. Add
chopped claw meat and sauté two minutes.
Add the egg-chives mixture and cook slowly over
medium heat until firm, about five minutes.
While the omelet is cooking, in another saucepan heat
½ tablespoon butter and cook the lobster tail for
three minutes. Slice and arrange on top of the omelet
and finish cooking in the oven two more minutes.
Place the cooked omelet on a serving plate and spoon
remaining sauce over it. Spoon caviar on top and
serve.
Bon appétit!
Originally published on
May 17, 2004 
