Читать книгу A Girl and Her Greens - April Bloomfield - Страница 11
ОглавлениеCRUSHED SPRING PEAS WITH MINT
As a girl in England, I always loved mushy peas, whether they were made the real way – from a starchy variety of pea called marrowfat that’s dried, then soaked – or dumped into a pot straight from a tin. Nowadays I prefer this mash made from fresh, sweet shelling peas – a twist on the British classic, which actually takes less work to make than its inspiration. It’s wonderful spread in a thick layer on warm bread or as a dip for raw veg, like radishes, carrots, and wedges of fennel.
makes about 300g
300g fresh peas (from about 900g of pods)
25g aged pecorino, finely grated
1½ teaspoons Maldon or another flaky sea salt
1 small spring garlic clove or ½ small garlic clove, smashed, peeled and roughly chopped
12 medium mint leaves
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Scant 2 tablespoons lemon juice, plus more for finishing
Combine the ingredients in a food processor and pulse to a coarse purée, about 45 seconds. Scrape the mixture into a bowl and roughly stir and smoosh a bit so it’s a little creamy and a little chunky. Season to taste with more salt and lemon juice – you want it to taste sweet and bright but not acidic.
SUGAR SNAP PEA SALAD
I admit that I’m hard on sugar snap peas. I get disappointed when they suck, of course, but I also get grumpy when they’re anything less than perfect – unblemished, super sweet, and not a bit starchy. That’s the curse of keeping high standards, I suppose: you’re so rarely satisfied. When at last I do find perfect sugar snap peas, I make this salad. I leave them raw – only the finest snap peas can be this delightful without a dunk in boiling water – and accentuate their flavour with little more than a lemony dressing and mint. If you’d like, you could add some creamy goat’s cheese in dollops or good old burrata alongside.
serves 4 as a side
450g sugar snap peas, trimmed and strings removed (see note)
A five-finger pinch of mint leaves, roughly chopped at the last minute
55ml Simple Lemon Dressing (here)
Maldon or another flaky sea salt
Lemon juice
A large handful of delicate, peppery rocket
So long as you find the right sugar snap peas, you’ll have a smashing salad. But I find that putting your knife to them adds even more excitement, a little textural variation and attractiveness. Accordingly, run the tip of your knife along the spine of some of the larger pods, open them like a book to expose the peas, and gently pull to separate the two sides of the pod. Slice others diagonally in half or thirds. Keep small ones whole.
Combine the peas and mint in a large bowl. Pour in the dressing and toss gently but well. Season to taste with more salt and lemon, if you’d like. Add the rocket to the bowl and toss gently to coat the leaves in the dressing without bruising them. Arrange it all prettily on a platter and serve straightaway.
PREPPING SUGAR SNAP PEAS
If you wish to remove the maximum string from your sugar snap peas, try this. With one hand, hold a pea so the concave side is facing you and the stem end is facing down. With the other, use a small, sharp knife to cut just below the very tip of the pea and pull towards you, removing the string in the process. Rotate the pea so the stem end is facing up and the concave side is facing away from you. Now cut just below the tip of the pea and pull towards you, removing the string along the spine of the pea. This goes quite quickly once you get the hang of it, and you never have to worry about a stringy bit mucking up a good bite.
BRAISED PEAS AND LITTLE GEM LETTUCE
To me, this dish, also known as petits pois à la française, is a classic because the whole is so much greater than the sum of its parts. The dish isn’t a vehicle for the peas or the braised lettuce to be the star; instead it’s all about the magic they create together. The lettuce heads become silky and meaty, the sweet peas pop in your mouth, and all that springtime flavour infuses the broth. This dish would be delightful with duck confit, roast duck, or grilled lamb alongside, though if you’re not in a meaty mood, stir in some cooked barley and you’ll have a hearty meal.
serves 6 as a side
3 heads Little Gem lettuce (about 450g), stems trimmed of brown but kept intact
55ml plus 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus a glug for finishing
6 medium spring garlic cloves or 3 medium garlic cloves, peeled and halved lengthwise
About 1 tablespoon Maldon or another flaky sea salt
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
450g young onions (see ‘Young Onions’, here) or Spanish onions, halved lengthwise and cut crosswise into 0.5cm-thick slices
110ml dry white wine, such as Sauvignon Blanc
300g shelled fresh peas (from about 900g of pods)
350ml Simple Chicken Stock (here)
A five-finger pinch of mint leaves, roughly chopped at the last minute
Remove and reserve the floppy outer leaves from the lettuce, discarding any blemished ones. Halve the heads lengthwise. Rinse, drain, and thinly slice the reserved outer leaves.
Heat 55ml of the olive oil in a wide heavy pot over medium-high heat until it shimmers. Add the garlic and cook, occasionally flipping and stirring the cloves, until they’re golden brown, 1 to 2 minutes. Use a slotted spoon to transfer the garlic to a small bowl.
Add the lettuce heads cut sides down to the pot (don’t be alarmed if they spit and pop a bit) and cook until golden brown, 1 to 2 minutes. Turn them over, add ½ teaspoon or so of salt, and cook just until they’ve gone translucent at the stem and wilted at the tips, about 3 minutes more. It’s OK if a few leaves fall off. Transfer the halved heads to a plate. Add the sliced lettuce, along with another ½ teaspoon or so of salt, to the pot and cook just until wilted and just about all the liquid in the pot has evaporated, about 2 minutes. Transfer to a medium bowl.
Give the pot a wipe, reduce the heat to medium-low, and add the remaining 2 tablespoons of oil and the butter. When the butter froths, add the onions and the cooked garlic along with 1 teaspoon of salt, have a stir, and cover the pot. Cook, stirring occasionally to make sure everything’s happy, until the onions are soft and creamy but not coloured, about 20 minutes. Increase the heat to high, pour in the wine, and boil until it’s nearly all evaporated, about 5 minutes.
Add the peas and return the cooked sliced lettuce to the pot, stir well, then return the lettuce head halves, cut sides up, to the pot along with the stock and 1 teaspoon of salt. Bring the stock to a boil, then reduce the heat to maintain a steady simmer, prodding the lettuce heads and peas a bit so they’re nearly submerged. Cook just until the peas are soft but still pop in your mouth and the flavours marry, about 15 minutes, depending on the size of the peas.
Add the mint and a healthy glug of olive oil and have a stir. Add salt to taste. I like to let it cool a bit before I dig in.
RAMPS WITH FRIED EGGS
As simple a dish as I can imagine, this heap of sweet, garlicky ramps, bright from lemon and chilli, is something I’d eat every day – if only those stubborn ramps didn’t have such a short season. Yet that’s part of their magic, isn’t it? You can’t always have them.
I like to eat the whole lot on toast. I like it with home fries. Sometimes I’ll fry up a few strips of bacon first, until they’re still a little bit floppy, then cook the ramps in the fat. The eggs make the dish all the more satisfying, though you can leave them out and serve the ramps as a side dish. Whether you use chicken or duck eggs, which are fattier and have a bit more character, make sure your oil is nice and hot so that when you crack in those eggs, the whites pop and spit and develop gorgeous crispy edges.
If you can’t find ramps, new season leaf garlic makes a good substitute.
serves 4 as a main
350g ramps, trimmed and separated into white bulbs, purple stems, and green leaves (see note opposite)
5 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into chunks
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Maldon or another flaky sea salt
4 large duck or chicken eggs
2 dried pequín chillies, crumbled, or pinches of red pepper flakes
½ lemon
Halve any ramp bulbs thicker than a medium garlic clove. Cut the purple stems into 2.5-cm lengths and slice the leaves crosswise into thirds.
Combine the butter and oil in a 30cm nonstick frying pan and set it over medium heat. When the butter melts, froths and gurgles, add the stems and bulbs, increase the heat to medium-high, and cook until the bulbs turn translucent, 2 to 3 minutes.
Add a generous pinch of salt to the pan and then sprinkle the leaves on top of the bulbs and stems. Stir briefly and shake the pan to distribute the greens evenly and let it all sizzle away, stirring occasionally, until the bulbs have spots of golden brown, about 6 minutes more. Use a slotted spoon to transfer the ramps to a plate, leaving behind as much fat as you can.
With the pan still over medium-high heat, crack the eggs into the pan, trying your best to leave a little space between each one. Sprinkle the chillies and a generous pinch of salt over each egg. Cook until the whites have just set, about 1 minute. Spoon the ramp mixture here and there over the eggs but not over the yolks.
Cover the pan, turn off the heat, and let sit until the eggs are cooked to your liking, 1 to 2 minutes for nice runny yolks. Season with salt to taste and squeeze on just enough lemon juice to add brightness, not acidity. Eat straightaway.
Note: When they first appear in markets, ramp bulbs are so sweet and slender that you can add them all at once with the stems and leaves, though here I have you start the bulbs and stems a couple of minutes early, in case they’re a bit starchy, which can happen further into the season.
POT-ROASTED ARTICHOKES WITH WHITE WINE AND CAPERS
One of the reasons I go giddy about springtime is artichokes, particularly the small ones with tips closed tightly, like a flower at night. Some home cooks are reluctant to fill their totes with artichokes, as they’ll need to be turned – the barbed leaves plucked off and the other inedible bits trimmed away. I quite like the process. It’s meditative and satisfying once you get the hang of it. In this dish, the fleshy artichokes get browned and crispy tops and look like strange, beautiful roses. The acidity in the white wine cuts through the rich, dense veg and, along with the salty pops from the capers, highlights the artichokes’ unique herbaceousness.
serves 4 to 6 as a side
55ml extra-virgin olive oil
1.5kg baby artichokes (about 18), turned (see ‘Turning Artichokes’, here)
2 medium garlic cloves, thinly sliced
1½ teaspoons Maldon or another flaky sea salt
330ml dry white wine, such as Sauvignon Blanc
1 heaped tablespoon drained capers
A five-finger pinch of mint leaves, torn at the last minute
A pinch of delicate flat-leaf parsley sprigs
Heat the oil in a heavy pot (wide enough to hold the artichokes with room to spare) over medium-high heat until it just begins to smoke. Stand the artichokes cut sides down in the oil, wait a minute, then reduce the heat to medium-low, sprinkle in the garlic and salt, and cook, without stirring, just until the garlic turns golden and smells toasty, about 3 minutes.
Slowly pour in the wine, cover the pot, and cook, without stirring, at a vigorous simmer until you can insert a sharp knife into the thick artichoke bottoms with barely any resistance, about 25 minutes. Five minutes or so before they’re fully tender, remove the lid and scatter on the capers.
Raise the heat to medium-high, and bring the liquid to a boil. Cook until all the wine has evaporated (the bubbling sound will become a sizzle), about 3 minutes. Add the mint and parsley and keep cooking the artichokes in the oil (it’s OK if a few of them tip over), until the cut sides of the artichokes are deep golden brown, 3 to 5 minutes. Lower the heat if necessary to prevent the artichokes from getting too dark.
Arrange the artichokes prettily on a plate, and scoop the capers, oil, and slightly crispy herbs over top. Serve straightaway or at room temperature.
TURNING ARTICHOKES
I suppose some people might find it a bother, but I quite like turning artichokes. It’s like an advanced version of shelling peas – similarly meditative and even a bit fun. Choosing artichokes whose leaves don’t move much when you pinch the tops will make your life a bit easier, because typically they have smaller chokes or sometimes none at all.
Fill a big bowl with water and squeeze in the juice of a lemon. Working with one artichoke at a time, pluck off and discard the green leaves until only the soft yellowish leaves are left. Cut off about 1cm of the stem. Use a peeler or small knife to trim away the tough green stuff at the base of the artichoke. Take a peek at the cut end of the stem. You’ll see a pale green circle surrounded by a darker border. Peel the stem, getting as close as you can to the pale green centre. Drop the artichoke into the lemony water (to prevent discolouration). Repeat with the remaining artichokes.
Cut about 2.5cm from the tip of each artichoke, then use a small spoon to scoop out and discard the feathery choke. Gently squeeze each artichoke over the bowl as you go, and set them cut sides down on kitchen paper to drain for about 5 minutes.
BOILED ASPARAGUS WITH RAMP BÉARNAISE SAUCE
Sometimes what seems like the least exciting way to cook a vegetable is the most lovely. I adore roasted and grilled asparagus, with those tempting golden-brown spots. Still, my favourite way to eat asparagus is boiled. That’s when it feels the most elegant in the mouth, fat and juicy and clean when you bite it.
The stalks require little more than a drizzle of nice olive oil and perhaps a spritz of lemon, but an even more thrilling accompaniment is a rich, bright béarnaise served alongside. It’s the sexiest thing, a béarnaise. I must’ve made this tart, rich French sauce, a sort of hot mayonnaise made with butter instead of oil, a thousand times when I worked under Rowley Leigh at the London restaurant Kensington Place. I don’t think I ever got tired of dipping vegetables in it or drizzling it over grilled fish or steak. In early spring, when ramps join bunches of asparagus at farmers’ markets, I swap the typical shallots for ramp bulbs and finish the sauce with ramp leaves instead of the more classic tarragon.
You can make béarnaise a few hours in advance, so long as you keep it somewhere warm. If you keep it somewhere too hot or chilly, it could split. To fix split béarnaise, add 1 teaspoon of warm water to a bowl, then add the béarnaise bit by bit, starting with a few drops and upping the amount as you go, whisking furiously with each addition.
serves 4 as a side
FOR THE BÉARNAISE
110ml Champagne vinegar or white wine vinegar
Scant 225g ramps, trimmed, green leaves separated, and everything thinly sliced (about 75g bulbs and stems and 150g leaves)
2 large egg yolks
1 tablespoon hot water, plus more if necessary
225g Clarified Butter (here), warm
1 teaspoon Maldon or another flaky sea salt, or more to taste
FOR THE ASPARAGUS
Sea salt
450g asparagus (spears as thick as an index finger), woody bottoms snapped off
make the béarnaise
Combine the vinegar and the ramp bulbs and stems in a small saucepan. Bring the liquid to a gentle simmer over medium-low heat and cook, swirling occasionally, until the vinegar has fully evaporated, 5 to 8 minutes. Let the mixture cool slightly.
Fill a small pot with a couple of centimetres of water and bring the water to a boil. Grab a heatproof mixing bowl that will fit in the pot without touching the water. Combine the ramp mixture, egg yolks, and the tablespoon of hot water in the bowl and whisk well. Set the bowl in the pot and whisk constantly, scraping the sides of the bowl as you do and lifting the bowl from the pot every 15 seconds or so. You want to cook the yolks as gently as possible. Keep at it just until the mixture has thickened to the texture of loose mayonnaise, about 2 minutes.
Remove the bowl from the pot and wrap a damp kitchen towel around the base of the bowl to steady it. Drizzle in the clarified butter in a very slow, steady stream, whisking constantly. (If after you’ve added half the butter, the mixture looks really thick and shiny, whisk in another tablespoon of hot water before you add the rest of the butter.) Stir in the salt and ramp leaves, taste, and season with salt to taste.
Set the béarnaise aside in a warm place.
make the asparagus
Bring a medium pot of water to a boil over high heat and season it generously with salt until it’s a little less salty than the sea.
Add the asparagus and cook just until the asparagus is cooked through but still snappy and juicy (the spears should give slightly when you give them a gentle squeeze), 2 to 3 minutes. Use tongs or a spider to gently remove the asparagus. Drain it well, pat it dry, and arrange it on a platter. Serve the béarnaise in a bowl alongside for dipping or drizzle it prettily over the top.
CLARIFIED BUTTER
When I plan to make béarnaise, hollandaise, and many other emulsified French sauces, my first step is to clarify butter, or melt the butter and cook it slowly so the milk solids rise to the surface to be skimmed off, leaving behind only the glass-clear yellow fat. Using this instead of regular melted butter is essential for achieving a sauce of the proper texture and also one that won’t readily split on you. Even if you’re not planning to make my ramp béarnaise (here), you should still give clarifying butter a go. For one, it’s good fun to have an excuse to melt a big old hunk of butter, taking plenty of sniffs as it bubbles away. Clarified butter also makes a great cooking fat, since it won’t burn at high temperatures like regular butter will.
makes about 675g
675g unsalted butter, cut into about 4cm pieces
Put the butter in a medium saucepan and set it over medium-low heat. Let it melt completely, without stirring, until it begins to bubble, then have a gentle stir. Let the butter bubble steadily, without stirring, lowering the heat if you spot any browning around the edges. Some of the whitish milk solids will rise to the surface, some will cook off, and some will settle at the bottom of the pan. Cook until the yellow liquid is nearly transparent (you’ll want to push the white solids on the surface aside to have a good look at the liquid), 10 to 12 minutes.
Use a spoon to gently skim the white stuff from the surface. You should be left with transparent golden fat with some opaque milk solids below. Slowly pour the yellow liquid butter into a container, leaving any remaining milk solids behind in the pan.
The clarified butter keeps in an airtight container for up to a month in the refrigerator.
SPRING EGG DROP SOUP
I hate muddling through a long winter only to suffer those odd early spring months when the weather is finally warming up, but the markets don’t seem to have noticed. Spring produce takes a while to shake off the cold. So when it does, an excitable cook like me tends to go overboard. I pop to the market to grab a bunch of asparagus and return weighed down by bags and bags of spring goodies. I want to use them all without cooking a dozen different dishes. So I make a nice soup, one flaunting a last-minute drizzle of eggs beaten with a little Parmesan so they set in silky, fatty strands. A variety of veg is fantastic here, but feel free to use just asparagus or just peas, if that’s what you’ve got or what you like.
serves 4
55ml extra-virgin olive oil
225g young carrots, topped, tailed, peeled and cut into 1-cm irregularly shaped pieces
230g chopped (1-cm pieces) bulbous spring onions
3 slim or 1 bulbous spring garlic head(s), roots and tops trimmed, tough layers removed, thinly sliced
2 teaspoons plus a pinch Maldon or another flaky sea salt
900ml Simple Chicken Stock (here)
225g asparagus, woody bottoms snapped off, cut on the diagonal into 1-cm pieces
110g sugar snap peas, trimmed, strings removed, and cut on the diagonal into 0.5-cm pieces
100g shelled fresh peas (from about 300g of pods)
2 large eggs
2 tablespoons finely grated Parmesan cheese
A five-finger pinch of mint leaves, roughly chopped at the last minute
A five-finger pinch of basil leaves, roughly chopped at the last minute
½ lemon
Heat the oil in a wide heavy pot over medium heat until it shimmers. Add the carrots first, then the onion, garlic, and 2 teaspoons of the salt. Cover and cook, stirring only after 5 minutes have passed and occasionally thereafter, until the onions are soft and creamy but not coloured, about 25 minutes.
Uncover, add all but 1 tablespoon of the chicken stock, increase the heat to high, and bring the stock to a vigorous simmer. Add the asparagus and both kinds of peas and cook just until they’re tender with a slight crunch, about 3 minutes.
Meanwhile, beat the eggs with the Parmesan, a pinch of salt, and the remaining tablespoon of stock.
When the green vegetables are ready, reduce the heat to low, stir in the herbs, then drizzle the egg mixture here and there over the soup. Have one very gentle stir, wait a minute or two until the egg sets, then take the pot off the heat. Season to taste with salt (be judicious, or else you will obscure the flavour of the vegetables), then squeeze in just enough lemon to add brightness, not acidity. Let the soup cool slightly before you dig in.
WATERCRESS SOUP WITH SPRING GARLIC
The watercress I dream about comes from Dave Harris at Max Creek Hatchery, in Delaware County, New York. ‘Hatchery’? you might wonder. Yes, Dave deals mainly in trout, fresh and smoked, but he also sells perfectly peppery, bitter watercress that grows wild by the water. He keeps sheep, too, that like to chomp on it while they’re grazing. Sheep eat everything, those little buggers. This soup features the sophisticated flavour of watercress balanced by the sweetness of slowly cooked onion and spring garlic. The soup’s silky body comes from potatoes, rinsed to wash away some of their starch, and, if I’m being honest, plenty of tasty fat. Fortunately, watercress is one of those vegetables whose strong flavour lets you know you’re eating something good for you. I like to think that’s all that matters. Add a spoonful of smoked trout roe for a special treat.
The soup will go from garden green to drab olive if you don’t serve it straightaway. If you’d like to make the soup the night before but retain its bright green colour, make an ice-water bath in a bowl large enough to hold another bowl and set the second large bowl in the bath. Once the soup is done, pour it in the bowl and stir until it’s cold. Transfer it to an airtight container and keep it in the fridge for up to a day.
serves 4 to 6
2 spring garlic heads, with stalks attached if possible (see ‘Spring Garlic’, opposite)
110g plus 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 large Spanish onion (about 450g), halved lengthwise and thinly sliced
2½ tablespoons plus a pinch Maldon or another flaky sea salt
450g russet (baking) potatoes, peeled, cut into 1-cm pieces, rinsed and drained well
450ml whole milk
450g mature watercress (not baby), bottom 2.5cm of stems trimmed, thick stems thinly sliced, the rest left whole
A small handful of delicate chervil sprigs, optional
110ml plus 1 teaspoon extra-virgin olive oil
120g crème fraîche
½ teaspoon black peppercorns, toasted in a small pan until aromatic, then coarsely crushed
Trim away the roots and cut off and discard the dark green tops of the spring garlic. Peel off the outermost layer from the stalks and bulbs. If your knife slides easily through the stalk about 10cm up from the bulb, thinly slice it and set aside. If not, save it to use as an aromatic in stock or sauce. Halve the bulbs lengthwise and if necessary remove any tough layers. Thinly slice the bulb, discarding anything you come across with which your knife struggles.
Melt the butter in a medium pot over medium-low heat, then add the garlic, onion, and 1 tablespoon of the salt and have a stir. Cover the pot and cook, stirring occasionally and reducing the heat if the onion threatens to colour, until the onion is very soft, creamy and sweet, about 30 minutes.
Add the potatoes, milk, the remaining 1½ tablespoons of salt, and 450ml of water. Cover the pot, increase the heat to medium, and bring the liquid to a vigorous simmer. Uncover, lower the heat if necessary to maintain a gentle simmer, and cook until the potatoes are fully tender, about 15 minutes.
Add the watercress and chervil (if you’re using it), let it wilt slightly, and gently stir to submerge the greens in the liquid. Bring the mixture back to a simmer, pour in 110ml of the oil, then remove the pot from the heat.
Pour the soup into a large mixing bowl. Working in batches, blend the soup (be careful when blending hot liquids) until very smooth, adding each batch back to the pot. (Whenever I make this at one of my restaurants, I use a high-power blender, such as a Vita-Prep, to get the soup especially smooth and fully bright green rather than green-flecked.)
Keep the soup warm in the pot and season to taste with salt. Combine the crème fraîche and crushed peppercorns in a small bowl with the remaining 1 teaspoon of olive oil and a pinch of salt and stir well.
Divide the soup among bowls, top with the crème fraîche mixture and serve straightaway.
SPRING GARLIC
At farmers’ markets, you see spring garlic in different sizes. For this recipe, try to find bulbous heads that are close in size to a head of standard garlic. Sometimes, especially in early spring, the spring garlic on offer might have slim heads, about the size of spring onion bottoms. These are just fine, though you’ll want to use 6 or so, including the tender parts of the stalks. Even on the larger bulbs of spring garlic, there’s a chance that the bottom 10cm or so of stalk will also be tender enough to use in this recipe.
ASPARAGUS QUICHES WITH MINT
I’m afraid that quiche has gone out of fashion, hasn’t it? I think I know why. When I was growing up, I ate some truly horrible ones, both home-cooked and shop-bought, packed with what seemed like a refrigerator’s worth of odds and ends suspended in overcooked egg. The only fun I’d have eating them was squidging the filling through my teeth. But as with most foods we think we don’t like, a truly excellent specimen can change our minds in a bite. My hope is that this quiche does just that with a delicate, flaky crust and an eggy filling that’s fluffy enough to banish those bad memories for ever.
You could eat quiche piping hot from the oven, of course, but I prefer it once it’s cooled a bit or at room temperature. Fresh from the oven, quiche tastes mostly of crust. Only when it cools does it all balance out, the crust stepping back a few paces and the egginess and filling marching forward to say hello.
Quiche makes a great vehicle for whatever vegetables are in season and a fun way to impress when you have a crowd over for lunch. Little quiches are really cute, but feel free to make one larger quiche, if you fancy. A 28-cm tart tin will do it, though you will wind up with some extra dough.
makes twelve 8cm quiches
SPECIAL EQUIPMENT
Twelve 8-cm wide, 2.5-cm deep ring moulds or tartlet tins
FOR THE DOUGH
375g plain flour
1 teaspoon sugar
½ teaspoon sea salt
¼ teaspoon baking powder
110g unsalted butter, well chilled and cut into 1-cm pieces
60g crème fraîche
55ml very cold water
FOR THE FILLING
Sea salt
450g asparagus (spears as thick as an index finger), woody bottoms snapped off, stalks cut into 0.5-cm pieces, tips left whole
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into several chunks
115g finely diced Spanish onion (about 1 small)
1 small bulb spring garlic, tough outer layer removed, bulb thinly sliced and then roughly chopped, or 1 tablespoon thinly sliced regular garlic
¼ teaspoon Maldon or another flaky sea salt
2 large eggs plus 2 large egg yolks
180g double cream
165ml whole milk
8 mint leaves, thinly sliced at the last minute
make the dough
Combine the flour, sugar, sea salt and baking powder in a food processor and pulse several times to mix them well. Add the butter and pulse until the mixture has the texture of fine breadcrumbs. A few pebble-size pieces of butter here and there is just fine.
Transfer the mixture to a bowl, pour in the crème fraîche and water, and use your fingertips to toss and gently smoosh the mixture just until it comes together as a dry, slightly crumbly dough. Don’t overwork it and don’t let it warm up too much. Cover the bowl and keep it in the fridge for 15 to 30 minutes.
Line your work surface and a baking sheet with baking parchment. Turn the dough onto the work surface and roll it out to an even 0.5cm thickness, dusting the dough with flour if the rolling pin sticks to it. Trace an inverted bowl with the tip of your knife to cut out twelve 11-cm rounds. Work swiftly to line each ring mould with a dough round, pressing the sides and bottoms gently. Put them on the baking sheet, cover them with clingfilm, and refrigerate for at least 4 hours or overnight.
bake the shells
Position a rack in the centre of the oven and preheat to 160°C/gas 3.
Cut baking parchment into twelve 12.5-cm squares. Crumple each square into a ball, wet the ball under running water, squeeze out all the water and flatten them out again. (This makes them more malleable.) Just before you’re ready to bake the shells (not sooner), take them from the fridge. (They must be nice and cold when you pop them in the oven, or else your quiches will be greasy.) Use one square of baking parchment to line each shell and fill each one almost to the brim with dried beans or raw rice. (You can save the rice or beans to use the next time you bake.) Put the shells back in the fridge for about 15 minutes.
Bake, rotating the baking sheet once, just until the dough is no longer raw but not yet coloured at all, 20 to 25 minutes. Remove the beans or rice and parchment squares. Gently prick the bottom and sides of the dough with a fork, which will prevent it from puffing up as it bakes. Return to the oven and bake until the shells are evenly light golden brown and the edges have pulled away from the sides of the pans, 25 to 30 minutes. Let the shells cool completely before you fill them. Leave the oven on.
make the filling and assemble the quiche
Bring a medium pot of water to a boil and salt it generously until it’s slightly less salty than the sea. Cook the asparagus stalks in the water just until they’ve lost their raw crunch, 1 to 1½ minutes, using a spider to transfer them to a colander to drain. Do the same with the tips, keeping them separate from the stalks.
Melt the butter in a medium cast-iron frying pan over medium-low heat until frothy. Add the onion, garlic, and Maldon salt and cook, stirring now and again, until the onion is soft and just barely browned at the edges, about 12 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat.
Combine the whole eggs and egg yolks in a large bowl and whisk briefly. Combine the cream and milk in a small pot, set it over medium-high heat, and cook just until it reaches a strong simmer. Immediately remove it from the heat, then very gradually pour it into the bowl with the eggs, whisking as you pour. Stir in 2 teaspoons of sea salt. Let the egg mixture, onion mixture and asparagus come to room temperature.
Divide the onion mixture among the shells, spreading slightly to form a layer. Spoon in the asparagus stalks (about 2 generous tablespoons per shell). Whisk the egg mixture, then ladle in enough of it to come up to about 0.5cm from the rim. Add the asparagus tips (two or three per quiche) and the mint. Pull the oven rack forward and carefully transfer the tray to the rack, then top off each quiche with a little more egg mixture. (This way the quiches won’t spill as you transport them to the oven.)
Bake the quiches, rotating the baking sheet once, just until the egg mixture has set, 20 to 25 minutes. It should no longer be liquidy, but should still be soft and moist to the touch.
Remove the moulds (or, if using tartlet tins, let the quiches cool slightly before carefully removing the quiches) and let the quiches cool slightly or to room temperature before you dig in.
ROASTED YOUNG ONIONS WITH SAGE PESTO
My knees go a bit wobbly when I pull these onions out of the oven, because I know they’ve given up every last bit of bite and become wonderfully creamy. They taste so sweet, you’ll have a hard time convincing people that all you did was roast them with salt and olive oil. No embellishment is necessary, but salty, woodsy sage pesto sure makes a nice one.
serves 4 to 6 as a side
6 young onions (the size of tennis balls), yellow, red, or a combination (see ‘Young Onions’, opposite)
Maldon or another flaky sea salt
110ml plus 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
A big handful of sage leaves
1 small garlic clove, roughly chopped
3 tablespoons pine nuts
25g Parmesan cheese, finely grated
Position a rack in the centre of the oven and preheat to 180°C/gas 4.
Cut off the onion greens, leaving just 1cm or so above the bulb. Peel off the thin, leathery outer layer of each onion and trim off the spidery roots, but make sure to leave the little nub intact (that is, the tough flat part the roots protrude from). This will keep the onions from falling apart as they cook. Halve each onion lengthwise and sprinkle the cut sides with a few healthy pinches of salt.
Find an ovenproof cast-iron frying pan or heavy enamelled baking dish wide enough to hold the onion halves in a single layer with a little room to spare. Add 3 tablespoons of the oil to the pan and set it over high heat until the oil just begins to smoke. Lower the heat to medium, carefully add the onions cut sides down and cook, using tongs to peek under the onions occasionally, until you see spots of golden brown, 5 to 8 minutes.
Pop the pan in the oven and cook until the cut sides are an even deeper golden brown but have no black spots, 20 to 25 minutes. Carefully turn the onions over with tongs and raise the oven temperature to 220°C/gas 7. Continue cooking until the onions are very soft but not falling apart, 10 to 15 minutes more.
Meanwhile, put the sage in a small food processor with the garlic, pine nuts, Parmesan and 1 teaspoon of salt, and pulse several times. Add the remaining 110ml of oil to the mixture and process full-on, stopping to scrape down the sides and stir gently if necessary, until the mixture is well combined but still chunky.
Arrange the onions prettily on a plate. Spoon some pesto, as much as you like, here and there on top of the onions. (Reserve the remaining pesto for another day.) Eat straightaway.
YOUNG ONIONS
At farmers’ markets in the spring, you’ll spot piles of onions with their greens attached. The onion bulbs will either be slim, like those of scallions, or bulbous. I think of the former as spring onions. I think of the latter, which are what you want for this recipe, as young onions, because their bulbs are big enough to become sweet and creamy in the oven but haven’t yet been left to cure and develop the papery skins of mature onions. I’m reluctant to say that you can substitute mature red onions, which have a sharper bite, because the result won’t be quite as sweet and delicious. Reluctant, but not opposed.
