Real spear deal

I got a couple of pounds of white asparagus at Farmer's Market for 99 cents/lb. Woo-hoo. Yesterday I made eggs benedict using some of the asparagus (it took forever to cook). Any other ideas?

[Robin Garr]

Digressing slightly, we're already eating (green) asparagus out of our garden over the past week or so, and it is just freakish to have it up this early in the Ohio Valley. What's especially strange is that it wasn't even all that warm a winter.

(Treebuds also popped out way early, and crocuses, jonquils and Bradford pears are also all flowering at the same time, and usually they're sequential. I keep expecting to see Al Gore turn up with a camera crew.)

Methinks the critters are just dying to pop up. We had a round spot over the cesspool on the first day of spring with a yellow crocus blooming in the center. It all was surrounded by about 18 inches of snow! Now the circle is much wider and the curoci (sp) are blooming like crazy.

For a different approach to asparagus I am really taken with a new technique I just picked up.

You cut off the tips (which are tender to start with) and then turn the stalks into flat thin strips using a vegetable peeler. Blanch everything in boiling salted water for TEN SECONDS and then cool to set color and stop cooking. This is a little labor intensive but you end up with great flavor, texture and appearance. I added it to a Japanese recipe for crab with soba noodles, and also used it making the original recipe where I learned the technique:

http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/crab ... agus-salad

Frank

[Jenise]

Frank, I like the sound of that and the different flexibility for use and presentation--look forward to trying it.

[Jenise]

I got a couple of pounds of white asparagus at Farmer's Market for 99 cents/lb. Woo-hoo. Yesterday I made eggs benedict using some of the asparagus (it took forever to cook). Any other ideas?

Cool deal, Larry. I adore white asparagus, but as long as I live up here I'm doomed to paying $5/lb or more when I'm even lucky enough to stumble over it. But yeah, it takes a bit longer to cook, and usually warrants peeling where green asparagus can go either way.

Steamed, with excess butter and a drizzle of Kuerbiskernoel (Austrian pumpkinseed oil). No need to gild the lily.

Digressing slightly, we're already eating (green) asparagus out of our garden over the past week or so, and it is just freakish to have it up this early in the Ohio Valley. What's especially strange is that it wasn't even all that warm a winter.

(Treebuds also popped out way early, and crocuses, jonquils and Bradford pears are also all flowering at the same time, and usually they're sequential. I keep expecting to see Al Gore turn up with a camera crew.)

It's in the 50s during the day here and we got crocus and daffodils galore. The clematis right outside the front door is going absolutely nutso - hundreds of blossoms.

Our clematis is still just leaves, but the color is bursting out all over the homestead. Despite the recent influx of frozen white stuff...