Jenmenke

Road Warrior

lemon

Stop the Insanity!

(Insanity as in asparagus.)

As I was working in the garden this weekend —  planting almost the remainder of the seeds — it occurred to me that the date was June 5th. Or 6th. I’m still not sure of the date because Charlie was using my watch this weekend to referee a soccer game and the strap broke. Note that in the picture above, I do have my watch on, which is confusing to say the least. I can neither remember the order of events, nor explain them to you. Just know that I speak the truth.)

(Yes, I yelled at him. And, yes, he denied any wrong-doing. So, yessss, I yelled some more and told him to bear some responsibility for the the things that just seem to “happen” to him all the time. “Be accountable,” I yelled!)

Anyway, that’s the only way I know what the date is, to look on my watch. Even that, as a source, is failing me mightily since the numbers are about two millimeters high and I can barely even see them anymore.

But I digress.

As I was working in the garden, it occurred to me that it was early June. The fact that I was in the middle of my insane asparagus bounty and still planting seeds shocked me. As I contemplated what I would say in this post, I realized that I would be writing for a small audience –only Minnesotans — for who else in this world considers June to be Spring?

Who cares, really? If you have fresh, tender asparagus, I’ve got a tip for you: keep it raw and put it in a salad. I won’t go so far as to tell you to eat spear after spear raw, like my dad does — because I think it tastes like grass — but in an effort to plow through a ridiculously large pile of the stuff after being gone for the weekend, I decided to try it in some salads. I made refrigerator pickles (good, but what isn’t good when soaking in sugar and vinegar?) and an asparagus quinoa salad (amazing!)

I highly recommend you try it. I’ve made the salad twice now, once with quinoa and once with bulgar wheat. Both were good and had their benefits. The quinoa was more fun to eat since the tiny grains burst and pop in your mouth like the little fish eggs on sushi (that sounds so gross, but it’s true). The bulgar had more eye-appeal since it had — at least the way I cooked it — less moisture and more contrast.

The salad would also be good with barley or orzo pasta.

I tried various implements to slice the asparagus razor thin and defaulted to a knife. The mandolin was a pain (and dangerous) because the asparagus tends to have a lengthwise fiber to it which interferes with the mandolin. Most of my stalks had this split toward the bottom:

 

…which is maybe a factor of them being so tall when I picked them. But made the slices less pretty. A vegetable peeler is great if you want long strips, but I found long strips to be too cumbersome to eat. So I just used a knife and cut them on the diagonal. Then I used the mandolin on a super thin setting and sliced up two radishes.

I also added garbanzos, toasted pine nuts, shaved pecorino (as always, my cheap and beloved substitute for ridiculously priced parmesan).

The quinoa was super salty (I like it like that) and a little “wet” (I don’t like it like that.)

I’m not a quinoa expert. I’m not even a novice. Is this the right texture??

Anyway, I dressed it with lemon juice and olive oil, salt and pepper. Who knew something that stupidly simple could taste so good? (Seriously. I did not know that.)

Asparagus Salad with Grains

  • 3/4 cup quinoa (or bulger or other grain) cooked according to package directions, but be sure to season with salt!
  • approx 8 thinly sliced raw asparagus spears
  • big handful pine nuts, toasted
  • 1 can of garbanzo beans rinsed and drained
  • 2 radishes, very thinly sliced
  • shaved pecorino or parmesan to taste
  • 1/4 – 1/2 fresh lemon, squeezed (amount to taste. start with 1/4 and add more if necessary)
  • 1/8 – 1/4 c olive oil (same as above. add more as necessary. I added 1/8 c with the wetter quinoa and 1/4 c with the drier bulgar wheat

Toss together all ingredients. It lasts for days in the refrigerator!

Here is a picture of what it looks like with bulgar wheat:

This is a spoiler alert, but I also added preserved lemon to my second batch. That’s fodder for another post, as you’ll see why later in the week, but it was good.

And as a point of reference in my ongoing battle of the asparagus bulge, here is a before and after of the pile:

Before making salads:

After:
Either I’m a bad photographer, or that pile didn’t change much.

Asparagus

The Honeymoon.

Yes, we are one week into the Honeymoon Stage of our asparagus harvest. That is the time where it is still a joy and a wonder to walk into the garden and find 20-30 spears that grew six inches overnight. I snap them off at the base, bring them in the house, briefly cook them and eat them. Pause over each sweet tender bite. Exclaim their virtues.

Asparagus.

It is the best!

Well, it is the best for about two weeks. After that, the walk into the garden is replaced by shock and dismay: Oh my GOSH. That damn ASPARAGUS! WHO am I going to GIVE it to? WHAT am I going to DO with it? Look at all the asparagus beetles!

But not yet. Now we just eat it and love it.

Soon I will be giving it away by the armload to friends. To each of these people I give a stern warning not to overcook it. The thing with my asparagus (and I assume all fresh-from-the-garden asparagus) is that it cooks in one quarter the time of supermarket asparagus.

Two nights ago, I took the unusual step of timing it so that I could give concrete directions instead of vague advice. So if I die, my husband will be able to feed my children from lessons learned on my website.

See? I’m a good mother after all.

Here you go, Dave (and anyone else who’s interested):

Use a big saute or fry pan, wide enough for your longest spear, add about an inch of water, sprinkle in about 2 teaspoons of salt and bring to a boil. After the water is boiling, add the asparagus, making sure all spears are submerged.

For fresh picked spears, cook no more than 2 minutes and drain. If you aren’t going to eat right away, cool them under cold water or in an ice bath to prevent them from getting mushy.

If you are cooking spears you bought somewhere and you aren’t sure how long to cook them, use a knife to pierce the stem end. It should go in easily, but not be soft or mushy. The tips should still look the same as they did when the were uncooked. The tips are the first part to show overcooking. The triangles will start to get fuzzy looking and may even start to slough off in the water. With fresh asparagus, that happens in a heartbeat! With store bought, you’ve got a little more grace time. If still in doubt, just cut a small piece off the end and taste it. It is my firm believe the stem end should retain some bite. Like an al dente noodle. (That’s the foolproof method to see if it is done.)

Dry the pan out, put on medium heat, and add about 1 tablespoon of either butter or olive oil (for 16-20 spears). Or, if you are decadent, add both. Add the spears back in and roll around in the butter/oil long just enough for the asparagus to get nice and hot — you don’t want to cook them more. Sprinkle with kosher salt, fresh pepper. Squeeze with lemon.  For what it’s worth, I like the combo of lemon juice with butter during the Honeymoon stage, then moving to olive oil with balsamic vinegar for Stage 2.

Garnish with parmesan or pecorino or manchego or whatever you happen to have on hand.

The nice thing about boiling/blanching and then reheating is that you can do it ahead of time. Then, right before serving, heat back up in the oil or butter and garnish. Of course for Caveman Dave, we have to keep some separate. He likes it plain.

We also roast asparagus in the oven and grill it. But that happens after long after the Honeymoon is over.