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I was inspired to perfect my French omelette skills over the summer and went out of my way to slowly improve each ingredient.

* I can earnestly say Kerrygold (or Irish butter from ALDI) makes a real difference than regular butter.

* I can say that kosher salt does help as well.

* I found a difference with (fresh cracked) white pepper but I don't personally prefer it over black pepper.

But most surprising to me (and what confirms your thesis) is I did not find a difference with the freshest of local eggs. I purposely went directly to a local farm with their own chickens, but nope- still the same as mass market eggs.

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I've tried every expensive egg that Sprouts and Whole Foods sells and the only ones I've found to be notably different are the Happy Egg Co. Heritage Breed Eggs specifically. Sprouts is the only place I know of locally that sells them. They're blue and brown, the shells are extremely thick, often have feathers stuck on them, and they're $8 a dozen (and have been all through the shortages and everything, the price has never gone up or down). The yolks are so dark especially in the summer it's astonishing.

Absolutely right on Kerrygold, in my experience. Nothing else I've bought has come close.

I will have to give those a shot, I've been working on perfecting my "over easy" fried egg flip.

I have found the same.

Fresh eggs make it easier to get the right texture, especially for new cooks (less albumin separation -- same reason fresh egg whites whip better). If you're already past the basics, freshness won't impact the result much outside of, perhaps, a bit of weepage.

Egg flavor is fairly resilient though. Even repeatable effects from, e.g., flaxseed in the diet, are pretty small. You might notice them, but in a french omelette the egg is a smooth base for delivering the actual food -- butter. I'd experiment there (very easy to make your own cultured butter at home) before playing with the flavor of eggs, and personally I basically ignore flavor when evaluating which eggs to buy.

For anyone else reading along, room temp eggs also make it much easier to get the right french omelette effect, especially without a nonstick pan. 5-10min in warm water if you refrigerate your eggs should suffice.

I have heard fresh eggs making superior poached eggs for the same reason.

They absolutely do. There are cheats and hacks you can use to make decent-looking poached eggs regardless (molds, vinegar and salt in the poaching water, double-cooking with an intermediate ice bath, straining off the weaker outer proteins before cooking, ...), but fresh eggs give a more consistently good result.

> I can earnestly say Kerrygold (or Irish butter from ALDI) makes a real difference than regular butter.

Was it Irish butter specifically or the butterfat %age? And if the former, did you compare to Normandy AOP butter?

I've only tried Kerrygold (which is Irish butter specifically) and the white label ALDI Irish Butter which is by all account I've read online...also Kerrygold.

I've never heard of "Normandy AOP butter", you'll have to enlighten me on that one.

Costco carries the New Zealand butter that's almost indistinguishable from Kerrygold. There are inevitably some flavor differences, but not when cooked and imo not in terms of quality.

White pepper is basically a different spice flavor than black pepper.

It is basically the difference between black and green tea where they are harvested at different times.

That explain a lot, I didn’t totally care for the flavor. It was sold to me as “just for appearance” (no black specks in the final product) in most recipes but I didn’t see that reflected.

Having a totally different flavor means it’s not really a direct sub and needs different partners in spice blends.

White pepper is most often found in Asian cookery, particularly Chinese, and in seasoning blends for fried chicken.

> I can say that kosher salt does help as well.

You many be interested in the video "When Should I Salt my Eggs? | Ask Kenji":

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZ6L1PVRjIk

Timing makes a difference.