What do I do with Asparagus?

[TheCunnyFunt]

DP has brought a load home from work for me to try. I haven't a bloody clue what to do with it! How do I cook it?

Steam until glowing green, dip in mayonnaise.
Or grill and add to a bacon sarnie or chop and add to spaghetti carbonara.

My two favourite ways are:

As a starter; snap of the woodly ends and boil till tender. Serve scattered with half a grated boiled egg, a teaspoon of capers (type in vinegar), a large pinch of sea salt flakes and a good slug of olive oil.

For a main; Cook as above, wrap in ham and cover with cheese sauce then heat in the oven. Serve with rice and salad.

For a first time I'd probably just serve with melted butter for dipping. My favourite veg!

My two favourite ways are:

As a starter; snap of the woodly ends and boil till tender. Serve scattered with half a grated boiled egg, a teaspoon of capers (type in vinegar), a large pinch of sea salt flakes and a good slug of olive oil.

For a main; Cook as above, wrap in ham and cover with cheese sauce then heat in the oven. Serve with rice and salad.

For a first time I'd probably just serve with melted butter for dipping. My favourite veg!

I love asparagus any which way. Here's a nice pasta recipe and so quick and easy.

500g penne
1 tin anchovies in olive oil + additional olive oil
2 bunches asparagus, bottom of stalks broken off and then cut on the diagonal same size as penne

Boil the asparagus and penne al dente per cooking directions. About five minutes before it's finished, over medium low heat, warm olive oil in a large saute pan. Crush anchovy fillets with back of a wooden spoon until a paste is formed.

Drain pasta and asparagus and turn up heat on saute pan with anchovies and oil. Stir pasta into the paste and cook over high heat for two minutes. Season to taste.

Thanks for the ideas everyone! Most helpful :)

To prepare them, make sure you wash them really thoroughly. The tips collect lots of fine dirt and they'll be gritty when you eat them. If the stalks are thick you will need to partly peel the edges, working with a small knife up the stalk from the base. Otherwise you'll end up with a mouth full of fibres.

Steamed, with a knob of butter.

I don't like them in eggs, I prefer bread soldiers :)

Plain grilled or steamed is nice to me, tempura is amazing (had it once at a chinese restaurant but don't own a deep fat fryer)

This soup is amazing - I make it once a year, it's my special treat
www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/asparagussoupwithasp_86323

BTW, it's never made my wee smell that I've noticed - what's it supposed to smell like?

It makes your wee smell utterly rank. Doesn't happen in everyone, there's a gene apparently that is linked to it...

Ok, I just boiled them and made some garlic butter. Then when they were done I added the butter to the pan and tossed them in it and added a bit of s&p. They were mainly yummy, except I used too much salt. Bleurgh.

Will update on wee later :o

Lucky you, sounds like a cracking lunch.

Wee takes about an hour or so to kick in. Have an air freshener to hand.

It doesn't affect everyone, though. A small percentage of the population cannot metabolise the substance in asparagus responsible for the smell, so no whiff for them.

Wee update! Just been for my second wee since eating the asparagus, the first one was just after eating it so it hadn't kicked it yet. The second one, smelt like what I would imagine rotting asparagus would smell like. That is weird.

Its almost enough to put you off eating the stuff.

Almost.

Almost, but not quite.

Jamie Oliver has fab recipe for asparagus soup with poached egg on top.
V low cal and not too much butter, but tastes YUM

Soup?

Break of the woody end stem (just grab a hold of each end and bend until they snap - they break in the right place)
Shove them on a griddle until they are golden and slightly charred
Drizzle on some olive oil and parmesan

yum!

?... asparagus, tinged with ultramarine and rosy pink which ran from their heads, finely stippled in mauve and azure, through a series of imperceptible changes to their white feet, still stained a little by the soil of their garden-bed: a rainbow-loveliness that was not of this world. I felt that these celestial hues indicated the presence of exquisite creatures who had been pleased to assume vegetable form, who, through the disguise which covered their firm and edible flesh, allowed me to discern in this radiance of earliest dawn, these hinted rainbows, these blue evening shades, that precious quality which I should recognise again when, all night long after a dinner at which I had partaken of them, they played (lyrical and coarse in their jesting as the fairies in Shakespeare?s Dream) at transforming my humble chamberpot into a bower of aromatic perfume.?

― Marcel Proust, Swann's Way