HASas discreet as he is talented, chef Thomas Graham shakes up the French classics at Le Mermoz, in Paris. Tart, vegetal and audacious, the cuisine of this 29-year-old Anglo-American can also be discovered through regular pop-ups.
“The omelet was a hole in my racket. In California, where I grew up, my mom basically made overcooked scrambled eggs. And at the Le Cordon Bleu school in Paris, where I came to train after high school, I learned the basics of French gastronomy, but not the omelet.
“I didn’t take the right pan or enough eggs, I didn’t stir them enough, I put the fire too high, it caught on”
It was never a problem for me until I joined the Haï Kaï restaurant. [quai de Jemmapes à Paris, désormais fermé] by chef Amélie Darvas. One day, a client shows up, she doesn’t eat fish or meat, and Amélie has the idea of preparing an omelet for her. The client loves it, she is becoming a regular. For weeks, I don’t pay much attention to the preparation of the omelette, which Amélie manages in her corner.
And then, one day, Amélie is not there and, as executive chef, I replace her; the customer arrives and orders her omelette. I didn’t know how to do it, but I had no choice. Obviously, I didn’t take the right pan or enough eggs, I didn’t stir them enough, I put the fire too high, it caught. I served really bad stuff. The customer was furious, the team in the room made me feel it, Amélie learned it and was not happy either. It was without doubt one of the worst cooking moments of my life.
Put a slap
When I became chef of Mermoz, in January 2020, I wanted to take my revenge on the omelet. To transform this basic recipe, which we eat almost everywhere but which is never stunning, into a dish capable of putting a slap in the face. The spring 2020 confinement gave me time.
The base is always good organic eggs, hazelnut butter, onion and fresh seasonal herbs. And the twist is the yuzu kosho, which I prepare myself: I take yuzu that I immerse in a bath of sugar and salt for several months before mixing them with olive oil. This allows you to use all the citrus fruit and keep its very frank acidity. Besides, it goes well with the parmesan that I grate on top.
When the omelette is ready, I roll it off the heat in nasturtium leaves, a technique I learned during my internship at Noma in Copenhagen. This veil has an aesthetic function – all green, the omelette is much prettier on the plate – but it also brings a pleasant vegetable taste.
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