Actually this is pretty quick. Once the ellipse is a path, you can just hit F2 (for the node tool), and click between two of the nodes (to select that path segment) and hit the AddNode button twice (which gives you three new nodes). Then you just drag one of them out.

The thing I like most about it is that I always end up messing up the curvature of the tail with the bezier tool. I'm just hamfisted when it comes to getting what I want first time out with the bezier tool, dragging that node out and adjusting the handles seems more natural to me. For me, this is better, but for others Shawn's suggestion would work just as well.

RQ