New season English asparagus, soft poached egg, lemon sabayon & smoked pancetta
Serves 4
At last it has arrived and is by no doubt a serious contender in every cook’s calendar for heavyweight champion of the ‘eat the seasons’ year – English asparagus!! And the season is short, so please get stuck in.
Asparagus has been grown in England since the sixteenth century but can be traced back to the earliest records of asparagus cultivation some 2,500 years ago. There is even a recipe for cooking asparagus in the oldest surviving book of recipes – Apicius’s third century AD De re coquinaria, Book III and it was cultivated by the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans.
A member of the lily family and reputed to have aphrodisiac properties, no more so than in the erotic work ‘The Perfumed Garden’ by 16th Century writer Shayak al Nefzawi, who wrote ‘a daily dish of asparagus, first boiled, then fried in fat with egg yolks and condiments, is recommended as having ‘great erotic effect’.
Alongside its aphrodisiac qualities, it is also believed to relieve indigestion, be a mild sedative, treat urinary tract infections as well as kidney and bladder stones. It also contains no fat or cholesterol, is very low in sodium and rich in vitamin C, folic acid, iron and potassium. All in all it is a good egg.
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Ingredients:
24 spears English asparagus
4 soft poached eggs
4 slices smoked pancetta, grilled until crispy & crumbled
50g baby spinach
For the sabayon:
50g water
3 egg yolks
100g unsalted butter, melted
10g lemon juice
1 pinch salt
1 pinch cayenne pepper
Method:
- Place the egg yolks and water into a metal bowl and whisk together over a pan of simmering water until thickened.
- Remove from the heat, add the salt and cayenne, slowly whisk in the melted butter, finally add the lemon juice.
- Blanch the asparagus in boiling salted water until just cooked, then cook the spinach.
- Place 6 spears of asparagus onto warm plates, reheat the poached egg and sit on the spinach next to the asparagus.
- Spoon the sauce over the egg, scatter the bacon over and serve.