The Recipe with Kenji and Deb - Asparagus

Episode Date: June 3, 2024

In this episode, Kenji and Deb talk all about asparagus. You can roast it, puree it, sautee it, grill it, and even eat it raw. It can serve as a snack or as part of a main dish. Did you know it grows in different colors? Hear how Deb prepares asparagus as a family snack and how it can make for a great pizza topping. And it wouldn't be an episode about asparagus without learning about the science behind its notorious side-effect. Recipes mentioned:Snacky Asparagus (from Smitten Kitchen)Shaved Asparagus Pizza (from Smitten Kitchen)Simple Grilled Asparagus (From Serious Eats)Braised Asparagus (from Serious Eats)

The Moth Podcast shares incredible true stories told live, and we've got a new episode all about food and memory that we think you'll really enjoy. And as I shared the last batch of fudge, the tears turned to smiles. Someone remarked, Nana's catering her own Shiva. How food brings us back to the people we love. The episode's available right now. Subscribe to the Moth Podcast to make sure you hear it. Isn't there a genetic thing where some people can smell a certain smell?

So asparagusic acid, I think that's how it's pronounced. Asparagusic acid is the acid in the sulfurous compound that some people can break down. And when they do, it turns into that aromatic, you know, what we smell in the bathroom, asparagus pee. But only some people can smell it as well. You have to have a specific genetic predisposition to be able to smell it. So there are people like me who can both produce asparagus pea and smell asparagus pea. There are also people who neither produce nor

smell asparagus pea. But what about you? What do you produce? I am a lady and I have no smells. I smell like daisies every day even when I've come from the gym. No sense. Nothing, just a blank space. Are there other vegetables that also produce it or is it just asparagus? I think it's just asparagus that produces specifically asparagus pea. Some people claim to be able to smell like garlic

and onions and cabbage. I think I've tried to remember who it was, but it was some food writer had said they have a sign in their bathroom like they ordered it from Etsy and it says, did you eat beets today? So you don't panic. And I thought that was really funny. Of course, that would never be the case for me

because I don't eat beets. I don't like them, but I've heard what happens. You don't like beets. Wow, when are we doing a beet episode? Oh, it'll be great. You could do all the talking. I can just be like, ew, yuck, ew. Why do they taste like dirt?

All right, so can we end this cold open now that we got the bathroom parts out of the way with like a giant flushing sound? And so. And so. And so. And so. And so.

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And so. And so. And so. And so. And so. help you discover your own perfect recipes. Kenji is the author of The Food Lab and The Walk and a columnist for The New York Times. And Deb is the creator of Smitten Kitchen. She's also the author of three best-selling cookbooks. We're both professional home cooks, which means that we can and will make the same dish 57 times in our quest for the perfect recipe. And on this show, we'll share our techniques

and ingredients so that you can figure out what works best for you. And this week we're talking about asparagus. That's what's coming up on the recipe, so stay with us. Have you dug up any cool and nerdy asparagus facts in preparation of this episode? My main asparagus facts were just about the pee. That's not a weird and random fact. For example, I read today that asparagus can grow three to five feet tall and in the right

conditions it can grow up to 10 inches a day, which is crazy. That's a lot. That's like you would just not have asparagus one day and you would have it the next. 10 inches a day is a lot. I think I grew asparagus once at my patio and it was just very skinny. And then it grew way too tall and it didn't taste very good because it got weedy looking, but I also had no idea what I was doing. I mean, asparagus, if you, yeah, I mean, the folks have never seen it grow.

It does. I mean, it basically, what you buy at the supermarket, it's just like that popping out of the soil. And like to me asparagus, you know, it is like the quintessential spring vegetable, you know? It's like the one that literally springs out of the soil first and then just kind of like shoots out. It always reminds me of spring.

And it's always the thing that you want to get at spring, but you can get it year round these days, right? Like it used to be a thing that you could only get in spring, but now it's like, it's a the thing that you wanna get at spring, but you can get it year round these days, right? Like it used to be a thing that you could only get in spring, but now it's like, it's a year round thing. It's like Peruvian asparagus in December, horrible? I don't know, I think it's fine. I mean, there's something really nice about it coming right from the farm,

but it's not always bad from the grocery store. I would say the stuff I got at the grocery store yesterday was pretty mid, because we're recording this a little bit before asparagus is out at the markets. It was not the best specimen, but with the right cooking technique, it was fantastic. That's one of the secrets of recipe development anyway, right? When you're writing for a magazine, you're working on recipes like almost like a year out. For example,

when I was at Cooks Illustrated, we were working on recipes eight to 10 months ahead of time. So we'd be doing next year's Thanksgiving turkey like in February. That's the hardest time to do it, to get a good Thanksgiving. It's actually easier to do a full year out when you're actually working in the season.

Right, because then you can actually get the turkeys. But yeah, no, I definitely hear about this from magazine editors running around looking for a turkey. They're always doing Christmas cookies in July on the hottest days, trying not to get that frosting to melt. So with magazines, you work about a year out, maybe a little less for a turkey. They're always doing Christmas cookies in July on the hottest days, trying not to get that frosting to melt. So with magazines, you work about a year, how maybe a little less than a year.

Newspapers, you're working like generally a couple months out. With blogs, the nice thing about blogs, spit in kitchen and serious eats, for example, is that you can basically be working in real time. And so it's like, if I'm writing about, if I'm publishing a recipe about asparagus, it's because I found asparagus like probably early, maybe even the day before, but probably

earlier that week or the week before we're finding out, I guess with podcasts, you generally have to work at least a few weeks in advance. How about when you're working on a cookbook though, because I did this whole thing. When I worked on my first cookbook, I wanted it to be really, I just wanted to work with like produce when it was in season for the best possible specimen. And so I basically just worked on it throughout a year and I did sweet potatoes when the sweet potatoes were at the market.

For my second and third cookbook, I've completely ditched that idea. In fact, I really like working with very off season produce because I know that if I can make an asparagus dish taste really good in like November, you're gonna have an even better experience with it when it's in season. So sometimes working with the sub-har

really helps you understand what it needs or like the worst case scenario of the outcome. I'm with you like in that I generally try and put myself in the shoes of someone who doesn't have access to the exact same things that I have access to. Like I live in the Pacific Northwest in Seattle doesn't have access to the exact same things that I have access to. Like I live in the Pacific Northwest in Seattle. I have access to great farmers markets.

We're in like a very seasonal part of the country. And so our, you know, what we get in the winter is very different from what we get in the summer and the spring. And so when I'm cooking, like for my family at home or for myself, I pay attention to that, but when I'm trying to write a recipe, I try and pay less attention to that. Like I try not to get things that someone reading my recipe who doesn't specifically live in Seattle at this time of the year, that that's anybody

will be able to read the recipe and get good results out of it. So, so I'm with you in that, you know, I try and make sure my recipes work. No matter what you have access to that said, some, you know, one of the nice things about writing online is that you can write about like hyper seasonal ingredients or even like ingredients that are difficult to get or really regional things and you'll find an online audience for it, right? It's different from writing for like writing a recipe for like a cookbook for example, but online you can write about weird stuff and people will find it.

But asparagus. What are the most delicious parts of the asparagus? What do you think is the most delicious part of the asparagus? All of it. All of it? All of it, okay. Probably the tip. I once spent, I, I, I staged in a Gordon Ramsay restaurant in London. Really?

There was one dish where they were cleaning asparagus and they were cutting off the top like inch and a half, you know, just basically just the really tight petals of the asparagus and then tossing out the stems, which to me was insane. They weren't even saving her for family stems, which to me was insane. They weren't even saving her for a family meal, which to me was crazy. But someone that day was like, oh yeah, like the, the tips are the sweetest part. They're the most flavorful part. But that always didn't, that didn't sit right to me because I, you know, I've always listened to you.

So when I used to watch Jacques Pepin, he would talk about broccoli and how with broccoli, the stems have a lot more sort of broccoli flavor than the actual flowers, you know, than the heads. And when you taste them, that's true. And I was like, well, asparagus should probably be the same also, right? Because it's also a flower that we eat. So shouldn't the stocks have more flavor

than the actual petals do? And when you try it side by side, they do. The stocks have a lot more flavor than the petals. They're sweeter, they're juicier. I think they taste, I don't know, I think they have more flavor. I guess if you count sweetness as the main flavor of asparagus, maybe a little bit less aroma, I don't know, I think they have more flavor. I guess if you count sweetness as the main flavor of asparagus,

maybe a little bit less aroma, I don't know. I think when they're perfectly cooked and well trimmed, like you've gotten to that perfect spot between where all the wittiness is gone and you just get the perfectly cooked stock. But we should talk about that because I feel like there's a great debate in the food world about the best way to trim asparagus.

And I think the typical teaching has been that you can just snap it and it will naturally break at the point where the wittier parts and the parts that you wanna eat. And I have found that to almost never be the case. I think that snapping can be really wasteful. I'm glad to hear you say that. I think it's really wasteful.

I think you're playing with it. Like sometimes that's where it snaps, but sometimes you're losing a lot more. I also have played around and I'm like, it literally just snaps between where my hands are. So I could put my hands at any point. Exactly. So if you hold these fairies,

even if you hold it like on the two ends, just by the angle of your fingers, you can make it snap basically wherever you want. And if you put your hands too close to the end, you just snap off only half the witty part. You can get it to snap at the right place. And sometimes I snap just because it's faster than cutting, right?

But I think the best way to do asparagus is feel, find where that witty part ends, and then either manually snap it there or just cut across it with a knife. It was luck. It was not science, if you ask me. What about peeling? Do you peel your asparagus? I have to say I don't do it all the time but if I wanted to look real like I would say when I picture the best tasting piece of asparagus it's

going to be cut at the right place and then peeled a little bit at the end. I just love the way it tastes. Well and the way it looks is certainly more appealing. Yes and that you know the skin gets a little tougher towards the end so it's I feel like it's the perfect place to peel. Am I doing that every time I make asparagus like literally turning each individual stalk and peeling it? No I'm not. I'm sorry Deb I don't want to let that dad joke just go right by you. I think I missed it. I was asking if the asparagus is more appealing that way. Oh that's a good one. I like that one. So asparagus, yes.

I am completely obsessed with, okay, Spargelzeit, I think. Okay. Spargel is like what they call it in asparagus in German. Yes, but Spargelzeit is actually the annual springtime asparagus harvest in Germany. And it basically starts in mid April. It goes through late June and it has a level of vigor and love for the vegetable. I find charming.

Like there's festivals, there's carnivals, there's a Spargelfrau. Have you been to Germany or Austria? I've been to Austria, but I've not been there during Spargel season. We were there during Spargel season. Have you been to Germany or Austria? I've been to Austria, but I've not been there during Spargel season. We were there during Spargel season a few years ago and it was wonderful. But the asparagus is a little different there.

The highly venerated and adored asparagus in Germany and Austria is the white asparagus. Made by growing without light. Like they pile soil on it so that it stays pale. Kind of like my late winter pallor. My bluish undertones. So white asparagus is, yeah, so you were saying the shoots are covered with soil as they grow. And I saw the term earthed up. I don't know if this is a gardening term, but I loved the term earthed up.

But there it's really considered like the highest calling of the vegetable. It's called white gold or edible ivory. It's called the royal vegetable. So usually it's obviously grown in Germany more than anywhere else. And when the season's over, you know, the festival's over. But I love how there's a whole celebration of it. And I want to know why we can't. Are you a fan of white asparagus? You know, I didn't grow up eating it, but my mother's family is German. They always think it's more delicious than green, but I think green is mostly what we can.

It's definitely like a more subtle flavor. It's not as sweet, I find it, and if you don't cook it properly, it can be quite bitter also. The old trick, what they tell you to do is boil them with a slice of bread in the water, which is supposed to absorb the bitterness, but it actually does nothing.

And you're supposed to peel it because the skin is more plasticky, I wanna say. Like it's a little, it's not like we often just peel or trim the ends of the green asparagus, but it's supposed to peel the whole thing, right? The skin tends to be a little bit tougher, but I peel almost all my asparagus. Even your green?

Yeah, I like the way it looks, the green and the purple. Yeah, unless it's very, very skinny. Oh, wow. That's a lot of work. That's how to work asparagus. I'm too lazy. I find it to be sort of therapeutic work. And then there's also purple asparagus.

I see that sometimes at the market, but not as much. But it's just pretty. It is pretty. It loses some of its purpleness when you cook it, unfortunately. That's true of purple carrots every other time, purple peppers, but. Yeah, yeah, a lot of those things that are better,

they're very good in salad, like purple asparagus that you shave with a vegetable peeler and you crisp up in a bowl of water until it kind of curls up. That looks really pretty in a salad. So let's talk about our recipes. You sent me a few recipes. One of them involves shaving asparagus like that and putting it on top in a salad. So let's talk about our recipes. You sent me a few recipes. One of them involves shaving asparagus like that

and putting it on top of a pizza. We should go through the cooking techniques because I feel like you can cook asparagus like, you've got raw, you have boiled, steamed, roasted, grilled, pureed in soups. I feel like there's so many things you can do with it and there's a lot of recipes for everything. There are, I mean, for me, I tend to be of the mind

that asparagus is one of the vegetables that's best, at its best when it's treated simply. So nine times out of 10, I'm going to be doing either what you suggested, one of the recipes you sent, which was just what you called snacking asparagus, which is where you basically blanch it in salted water, and then you chill it in ice water, and then you eat it. Well, you make sure you get all the moisture off of it, but then you eat it

with a mayo based dipping sauce and yours, you just call for mayo. I think in their photograph, you put a little bit of olive oil on there. Lemon salt. And then I usually do some pepper flakes too. So it's kind of dressed like a salad and then you just can dip it in plain mayo. And if you don't like mayo, which I'm sure somebody's going to tell me, you could use a yogurt sauce or even like a lemony tahini dressing is really nice there too. Growing up, we had, we, my mom made it that way, so she would just blanch it in ice water

and then ice it and we would have it chilled with Kewpie mayo. Mmm. So that was like, that was like a very common side for us with the, was asparagus with a little bit of Kewpie mayo dolloped on it. Do you ever mix the Kewpie mayo with a little bit of sesame oil, like a drop of soy sauce? I've done this before. It's a sesame asparagus and carrot chop, but basically the dressing is, I use a Kewpie mayo, but you can use any kind.

Sriracha, sesame oil, a little bit of soy sauce, and then the salad is thinly sliced rainbow carrots, thinly sliced raw asparagus, and then some diced avocado. It's really good together. That sounds good. And then you can like, sesame seeds all over. But it's a very, it's a very simple salad. I don't think it's like the most made recipe in the book by any measure.

No, that sounds very good. Cold asparagus with any kind of mayo based dressing works for me. I mean, for me, my favorite thing to do when you have really great asparagus from the farmer's market, it's going to be kind of juicier and sweeter and just more flavorful in general than what you can get the rest of the year.

But when I have that kind of really special asparagus, my favorite thing to do is to blanch it and then serve it with some homemade mayo, you know, like a, an a, either an aioli, something with garlic or maybe something with like a bunch of herbs, like fien herbs, you know, like tarragon and chervil and parsley and, and chives chopped into the mayo. And you just have like the sticks on a plate and like a little cup of mayo on the side to dip into. And then you just serve it

and people eat with their fingers. I think that's the best, right? That was the main thing is that I felt like usually when I made asparagus, it was like, you know, we ate it or we didn't. I mean, my husband and I would eat it, but the kids wouldn't reliably. But when I leave out that plate of the cold,

still bright green, a little crunchy with like a little dipping sauce, it just disappears like when the kids are walking by it, which is what I want. I want you to have like drive by vegetables. But I had started doing that and I'm sure your mom was too doing this cold blanch thing because I love grilled asparagus. I love roasted asparagus, but five minutes after you cook it, it's shriveling. It's lost its texture.

When you poach asparagus and you pop it in that ice water bath, like it preserves this perfectly cooked, crisp, tender, bright green moment in time, not just for then, but like you could put the leftovers in the fridge and eat it two days later and it would be just as good. And I really like that kind of prep. Like, oh, I bought three pounds of asparagus at the market.

Like if I prepare it this way, I just have it kind of indefinitely and it's gonna taste good. So grilled would probably be my second most common way to prepare asparagus. So anytime I'm grilling, like if I wanna make a real simple grilled meal, right? Like I'll go and like buy a chunk of meat,

you know, like a steak or a chicken breast or whatever it is and a bunch of asparagus. And like, I feel like that's all, like that a chunk of meat, you know, like a steak or a chicken breast or whatever it is, and a bunch of asparagus. And like, I feel like that's all, like that's kind of all you need. And then like a really hot fire, you know, and then you, and you grill the asparagus as hot as you can so that it gets charred on the outside,

but it still retains kind of some bite to it, you know, and it's still super bright green. As long as you aren't overcooking it to the point that it starts to shrivel up, I think, I feel like you can let it get cold and it'll still be okay. Especially if you have leftover grilled asparagus, chopping it up and tossing it into a salad

with a nice vinaigrette, something like that, works really well. I absolutely, I love it. I love charred asparagus, I love grilling it, I love roasting it. So it's really, but when I was thinking of something I can prepare ahead of time and it's gonna be good for a while and always look really pretty

That's when I got really into the cold poach, but apparently I have 35 asparagus recipes on Spinn Kitchen So I've done a lot of things with it over the years from raw to roasted to blanched to shaved But I had never done and I made this recipe of yours yesterday. I'd never braised it before. So I loved trying something new. I loved having like a new way to cook it. I loved braised vegetables. And I also like, I feel like it opens up a whole conversation about vegetable cooking

that I would love to have, because you talk about this in the head note, I was using the version on Serious Eats, but I know you also have it on your YouTube, which is just that you end up with this sort of drab green color, and we're not supposed to want to eat drab green vegetables. So you start by heating up oil in a skillet,

and then you put your asparagus in there, and you cook the asparagus until it's browned on a couple of sides and then you hit it with stock and butter and then you put the lid on immediately and you basically let the asparagus steam and braise in that stock and butter mixture until the stock and butter emulsify and form like a sauce that coats the asparagus and the asparagus is completely tender. Like it's not mushy, but it is. It's definitely not like snappy, crunchy. Like it's floppy and flaccid and drab green,

olive green as opposed to bright green. It's delicious. It's broth, it's butter, it's seasoned. It's really good. And I have to say, it was a huge hit last night. I thought that usually it's my son who's less picky. He's older too. He didn't wanna touch it.

And then my daughter who eats nothing, like eats everything, was like, this is so good. Jacob, why don't you wanna eat this? She's like flopping it around. She loved it. So, which she has a thing for vegetables though, despite her like not eating things. So she loves green beans. So maybe, maybe that was it.

Reminded her of a green bean. She loves edamame. So, but it was a big hit. We ate the whole thing. And then I was like scooping up the sauce with anything I could. Nice. Yeah. I like, I mean, the buttery,

the sauce comes out nice and well, you really get sort of the natural sweetness of the asparagus. Like I think it really accentuates it because you get that, you know, because some, the buttery, the sauce comes out nice and well, you really get sort of the natural sweetness of the asparagus. Like I think it really accentuates it cause you get that, you know, cause some of the asparagus flavor comes out into the stock

and then emulsifies with the butter. And so you can really sort of taste that sweetness come out into the sauce, which I think is delicious. That's a dish that braised asparagus. That's a dish I learned from Ken Oranger, who was the chef at Clio, a restaurant I used to work at. But we used to do an asparagus dish there that had a bunch of different types of asparagus on it.

So one of them was prepared completely in the microwave. You take asparagus spears, put them on a plate, cover it in plastic wrap, like splash a little bit of water and put a little bit of butter on there and then microwave it. And they kind of just like steam. And it's actually a really great way to, the microwave is a really good method for steaming vegetables

whether it's asparagus or broccoli things like that and then this braised asparagus that we did on that dish also we would braise it and then as soon as it was cooked you'd transfer it out into a sheet tray so that it cools down and then that we would also reheat okay the microwave is a really good place is a good way of reheating green vegetables um that's awesome i want to try because i've done the corn in the microwave thing before and it's really good. We did it last night. Oh yeah, have you ever done like four minutes, hoscon, it comes out really hot,

but you get, I love it, because when you cook it inside the hoscon, I feel like you get a lot more sweetness and steaminess and flavor, and then you can just slide it right out and it's not bad at all. Oh yeah, I think the microwave is the best way to cook corn.

If you don't want it charred, like if you just want like steamed corn, the microwave is the best way to do it. If you don't want it charred, like if you just want like steamed corn, the microwave is the best way to do it. All right, well obviously we're gonna have to do a corn episode for the summer. We will. We're gonna have to. So let's talk about the pizza.

Did you make the pizza? Okay, so I think what had happened was in 2009 or 2010, I think I went out to lunch with my editor. Maybe after signing my first book deal and I had a shaved or ribbons asparagus salad. It made me Union Square Cafe. It was a raw one and it was just dressed gently with like olive oil, lemon juice, salt, pepper,

and then shaved Parmesan. And it was so good and I hadn't had raw asparagus before. So I think the first time. That sounds like a Union Square Cafe dish. It definitely does. Like very farm to table by farm. I mean, back then the That sounds like a Union Square Cafe dish. It definitely does, like very farm to table, and by farm, I mean back then, the green market was a block away, not even a full block. So now it's like four whole blocks away.

So I had this ribbon asparagus and I loved it. And I think I immediately put that recipe on the site. And then it didn't really like, it had a moment, but it didn't take off the same way. And then I think about a year later, I did this pizza where you do the same thing where you take the ribbons asparagus and you ribbon it with a peeler.

Use a vegetable peeler. I like to use a white peeler, but, and you just put it like right on. I should have had like a piece of asparagus as a prop, but I don't today. I ate it all last night. But you ribbon it and it's really, and that one you toss it with some olive oil,

salt and pepper, and then you just put it on this mixture of cheese, Parmesan, mozzarella, salt, pepper, garlic, lemon. It's just, it's all the things that- It's super simple. It's super simple. And I did not expect it to have this thing where it took off, but I loved seeing how many people made it.

I even put the recipe in my first cookbook after that. I think it's wonderful. So like asparagus on pizza, when you do it like this, it kind of, it curls up and it gets like a lot of like little brown, crunchy, not crunchy, but like little brown, sweet nutty edges. You know, the same way, I guess the same way that you get when you do, when you grill asparagus or when you broil asparagus, but you get a ton of it on top of the pizza. And then because asparagus is like, it's, it's not, it's a green vegetable, but it's a lot less watery than a lot of other green top of the pizza. And then because asparagus, it's a green vegetable,

but it's a lot less watery than a lot of other green vegetables, you know? And so I think it works out really well on top of the pizza. Well, I don't know, because you try doing something like this with, I don't know if you put zucchini on top of pizza, for example, it gets really wet.

It can, if you don't cut it really thin or blot it, yeah. Yeah, well zucchini, I'll usually cut it, I'll usually shred it, salt it, and squeeze it before I put on pizza. But with asparagus, you can just go right on. And all the moisture just kind of cooks out and it's really delicious. Did you try it? I didn't use your pizza dough recipe.

I have a pizza oven. I use my own dough. That's awesome. But but I did the asparagus and scallion and mozzarella and Parmesan combo. Right. I forgot the scallion in there, too. I always need a little. Yeah. I should do a I haven't made that in there too. I always need a little onion. Yeah, yeah. I should do a, I haven't made that in years. I love it though.

It makes me very happy. I love a simple vegetable pizza. I love a really green vegetable. I love a green pizza. My only thing is I added some lemon to it. That's so funny, cause I was looking at the recipe before and getting ready for this episode.

I'm like, why is there no lemon here? There's no way. I there's no way I'm not finishing this with lemon. But then I also look at the ingredient list and it's so short. And sometimes I forget that alone could be the reason that the recipe is so popular on this site. I was like, Oh, I didn't use any funky cheeses. I didn't use anything like I was like, I really, it's like five ingredients. Is it something like that? A lot of the recipes we're talking about today, this one really feels like more

of a technique than a recipe, you know, because it's like, it's really just about shaving the asparagus. I would also say I also soaked my asparagus in water. Like, so the way I generally do asparagus is if I'm going to shave it is I shave it directly into the salad spinner. Like fill up, I fill up the whole salad spinner with water and I shave it directly into there and then I kind of let, I fill up the whole salad spinner with water and I shave it directly into there. And then I kind of let it soak for about half an hour or so

just so that it, the asparagus kind of curls up a little better. I want to try that. Cause I soak the asparagus before I use it to kind of get it a little more crisp and juicy and flavorful, but I've never done it after. Yeah, you should do it after. So shave the asparagus first

and then soak the shavings in water and they curl up and get really tight and curly. Like really nice. Cause once you have that asparagus first and then soak the shavings in water and they curl up and get really Tight and curly like really nice because once you have that asparagus you toss it with olive oil and it goes on the pizza And then everything else is like does it have to be mozzarella and parmesan? No, it's like you could use like goat cheese on there. You could use you know, like a ricotta on there What whatever you want you can use a smoked cheese on there and I feel like it would all still work out just fine Right. It's really one like once you get that asparagus down everything else is kind of you do it to your own taste. Deb, we got to take a little break but after we get back for the break should we talk about asparagus? I'm not bored of it yet.

Welcome back to The Recipe with Deb and Kenji, and today we are talking about asparagus. So let's talk about shopping for asparagus. So that's interesting to me. So when you go to the farmer's market and you see asparagus, what do you look for? I'm looking for the tops to not feel too dry, and I'm looking for the bottoms to look like they're as freshly cut as possible. No shriveling for it to be a firm to the end. Okay. I mean, hopefully it's in a little bit of water because after it's cut, it will start

dehydrating really quickly. So it's ideal that you want it in like a little half inch or puddle of water. Asparagus are flowers. So standing upright in water, just like you would see any other kind of cut flower with some tight tops. But what about like the actual size of the asparagus? What are you looking for? I love all types of asparagus.

I have, sometimes I like the pencil asparagus and I like the really thick ones, especially for the snacky, I like the really thick spears. So for me, I appreciate all kinds, but I wouldn't use them all the same way. You gotta really watch the cooking time with the skinny ones or it gets mush. You do.

Yeah. Yeah. So for me, it's much rarer that you're going to find really big fat asparagus. So when, as soon as I see it, I snatch it up. And for me, I also find the big fat asparagus just to have a little more flavor, it's, it's sweeter, but it's kind of juicier, the skinny, the smallest pencil asparagus, which are calling pencil asparagus. I think, yeah, I think that works great on a grill or under a broiler,

anything where you're gonna do really high heat and get some nice charring on it before it turns to mush. I was gonna say, there's something called wild asparagus that's even skinnier. I mean, it really looks like thick grass and that's fine, but I meant more like at least just the market that sets up close to me, I mean, I closed to a few markets,

but the one that sets up closest to me in my neighborhood, they usually get asparagus first or very early on and I feel I usually feel like based on past years the first batch is usually pretty skinny like it always is like has a nice red rubber band on there probably photographed it many times. It's very dapper looking and it's almost a little purpley at the top and I've always liked that but that I agree with you for that one I would definitely do like the high heat fast grill and then just hit it with lemon juice and olive oil.

But I'm thinking again about your braising, because we were talking about like how it kind of discolors it, and I think that makes people run away, that we want things to stay their original color, but there's so much deliciousness, and when the color starts to leach into the sauce. Oh yeah. Depending on where you grew up, like your culture and like how people cooked, you know, there's a lot of traditions of long cooked vegetables in the world, but it

definitely has not been like the trend in the United States for the last 20 to 30 years. In fact, I would say our vegetable cooking times are bracing each other to zero. Yeah. Where, I mean, I have more than one raw asparagus preparation and I do things with raw zucchini and I have raw cauliflower salads and raw broccoli salads, but to willingly, you know,

to intentionally do the opposite is there's something very delicious that happens with longer cooking times. Even just that 10 minutes for the asparagus, there's a sweetness. There's a, you talk about getting more of the flavors out that you don't get in shorter cooking times. So you just have to get over your bias against beige vegetables.

Sometime like in like the, in the 2000, in the early 2000s, maybe in the late nineties, like we collectively developed a fear of overcooked vegetables or vegetables that are cooked beyond just like a You know a plunge in hot water and a plunge in ice water But tastes change over time obviously and it's not like everybody always wants their vegetables just bright green like that But that's sort of what the mode was in the early 2000s I feel like everybody just wanted bright crunchy green beans And if it was if the green beans were cooked until they were a drab green or if the broccoli was soft Then like no, that's like,

that's how your parents made it. And we're not going to make vegetables how your parents made them. Right. A lot of times our parents were getting frozen vegetables. So you weren't going to get a crisp from it, but with the availability of like fresh vegetables year round, I think we want to like preserve more of that. But what's the weirdest thing you've ever made with asparagus?

Cause I was going through the archives and spent' Kitchen and I was like, I've done some weird stuff with asparagus, it turns out. When I was working at a restaurant, this is what I was working at a restaurant called Number 9 Park, also in Boston, and I had a girlfriend who was coming in to eat and I wanted to impress her. And so I made this like, it was an old school recipe, like an ascoffi or like maybe it was something in LaRusse gastronomy. It was like an asparagus flan that was like

an asparagus custard that was lined all around with asparagus spears that were like kind of standing up. So, you know, it kind of looks like a, like a medieval fort. Picket fence. So did it work? Was she impressed? So it didn't work out.

Yeah. And I blame the asparagus flan. The flan alone though, you know, that sounds amazing. I should try making that same flan. I have a feeling it's gonna end better. So what's so strange? I don't know, what's the strangest thing you've made with asparagus?

Apparently at one point I made something called asparagus stuffed eggs and it's a kind of bizarre and slightly fiddly recipe adopted from Julia Child, but I kind of basically think of it like as French deviled eggs. So you basically, you're really like cooking the asparagus, pureeing it, sieving it, and then mixing that into the egg yolk center with some Dijon to kind of make a stuffed egg. So it's like a deviled egg,

but it's green. And I don't know why I was so charmed by it because it's kind of fiddly to make. Does it taste good? It does taste good, but it doesn't taste as robust as it should. I thought it would just be like a pretty little appetizer. Like I'm imagining like eating deviled eggs while smelling asparagus peas. No, you're not smelling what comes out of you while you're eating. Okay. So stop that.

That was definitely one of the odder ones, But I also, I really like it in, like I've done it where I've chopped it, I have these spring vegetable pot stickers. So there's some fava, some peas in there. I really think it tastes great with a lot of those like Asian-ish ingredients, you know, and I really love it in a stir fry. I have a couple of asparagus recipes in my book,

in the walk, also on Siri Seats, but yeah, stir fry, like stir fried spring vegetables, asparagus, and morels, and ramps that are stir-fried together with chilies and such on peppercorns, I have a recipe for that. Yes, that sounds so good. And then I also have a recipe for a cold

poached asparagus salad with a hot and numbing chili oil. I also have a recipe, I don't know if I sent you this one, but, so you poach asparagus the exact same way as if you're gonna be serving it with mayo, but instead of serving it with mayo, you serve it. What I do is I make a dressing that's about 80% dashi. You can use like powdered dashi, like hon dashi, something like that if you want.

5% soy sauce and around 10 to 15% mirin. So it's like a sweet and savory. It's basically the same sauce you would use for dipping tempura or something like that. Cold poached asparagus that's just tossed with some of that. You put it in a bowl, ladle on some of that sauce, and then I do shaved bonito flakes on top, like katsuo bushi, shaved bonito flakes,

maybe a little bit of ground sesame seeds, something like that on top. I've definitely done a lot of salads. I've done a couple versions of sort of cold potato salads with more of a mustardy dressing than the creamy mayo. I have a spring salad with new potatoes where you're using fresh potatoes and poached spring vegetables.

And I love that because for me, that's my perfect potato salad. I love a potato salad. I love a salad with potatoes versus a potato salad with a couple of flecks of vegetables. And that's what that is. It's like my perfect spring lunch salad. Asparagus and potatoes, yeah, with olive oil,

a good olive oil,, maybe some canned tuna, that would be good. One of my go-to salad moves when I have leftover vegetables is, basically I take either yogurt or labneh, season it with olive oil, lemon juice, maybe sometimes some tahini or garlic, something like that, salt,

and then just kinda smear it on a plate, and then just put leftover grilled vegetables on top, so it could be like leftover asparagus and you could compose it, you know, you could toss it with some like sliced onions, some lettuce, whatever you want and make a salad out of it and just pile it on top. But I think any kind of just like cold,

leftover grilled vegetable that you pile onto like a plate that's smeared with seasoned yogurt and then squirt some olive oil on there is really good. I love it. I also love it when the yogurt sauce is under, like I like this, we talked about this with the iceberg episode, like I love it when a thick dressing

is underneath the food, not on it, so you pick it up rather than smear it over and it's not gonna get distributed otherwise, but it's very easy to pick it up with your fork every time you take a bite. You fork the asparagus and then you smear it through the yogurt to eat it. I have a spring asparagus pancetta hash and I love this one because it's literally four ingredients.

It's like you cook pancetta, dice, you could use bacon too, pull it out, then you cook the potatoes in the drippings. Then you add diced asparagus, usually I cut the segments pretty small so it's almost the size of the little cubes of potatoes. Add that at the end and then you add diced asparagus, usually I cut the segments pretty small so it's almost the size of the little cubes of potatoes. Add that at the end and then you add scallions and it's like such a fun thing to do where you end up with the crispy little nuggets of salty pork, you get the potatoes, you get the asparagus, it's not overcooked and that you put an egg on top of and I haven't made

that in way too long. I should make that soon. It's so easy. Four ingredients. One of my very first restaurant jobs was making asparagus ravioli. So you take asparagus, blanch it, just until it was bright green,

shock it in ice water, and then very thinly slice it, and then we folded it together with ricotta, parmesan, and chopped parsley, and that was the filling for the ravioli. That sounds amazing. And I don't think I've made asparagus ravioli since probably then, since 2003-ish.

When you make it, could you put some in a freezer pack and send it to me in New York? I would appreciate that. Yeah. I also, I really like a very simple asparagus soup. Almost like the French kind where it's just cooked with some, it could be vegetable broth, but I've usually had it with chicken broth where

you, you know, might cook it with some aromatics and blend it. And then you always have to leave a couple pieces unblended that you put on top and with a little cream and some lemon in it. And I, I crave that. My best friend's mom used to make it every Christmas Eve. So she was definitely making it in the off season. Like that was her tradition from growing up. They always had asparagus soup on Christmas Eve. So she was definitely making it in the off season. Like that was her tradition from growing up. They always had asparagus soup on Christmas Eve and I used to love having it over

there and I never once considered that it was out of season. It doesn't matter anyway. It's soup, you know, the texture is not, or the color of it wasn't going to be. But I crave it. I want to make it. Sparkle soup. Sparkle soup from your Sparu. I just want to be a sparkle frau. Deb, let's talk about asparagus and eggs because I feel like asparagus and eggs is so classic. It's a classic combination and it's eggs in like almost any form you can think of. It goes well with asparagus. Poached. Yes, so simply topping it, topping asparagus with a simple poached egg like having the be the sauce for it like that's a very classic way to do it. We used to do this dish at a restaurant I worked out which was the braised asparagus with a simple poached egg, like having the be the sauce for it, like that's a very classic way to do it. We used to do this dish at a restaurant I worked at, which was the braised asparagus that you made, the recipe that I sent you, braised asparagus, some sauteed mushrooms,

and then kind of all tossed together with the braising liquid from the asparagus with butter, and then all that is was sort of just used as a sauce for a poached egg, and that was basically the whole dish. It was like basically braised asparagus, sauteed mushrooms in a kind of buttery sauce on top of a poached egg with some croutons. And it was really delicious. Asparagus goes really well in like frittatas. Asparagus goes really well in omelets.

Like those are very classic places to put, even just like the simple eggs with asparagus, they only that's like asparagus and eggs right there again. Asparagus, even non-chicken eggs like asparagus goes really well with salmon eggs. It goes really well with uni with like sea urchin roe. One of the things we had when we were in in Austria during Spargel fest, Spargel season was white asparagus that just had hard-boiled eggs and asparagus and white asparagus and lemon and olive oil. It was delicious. And was the asparagus cold or warm? This was warm asparagus and warm eggs,

but you could easily do it cold also. I think I would love to do your braised asparagus next time. If I didn't have pencil asparagus, I kind of wanted either just maybe cut it the long way, create like sort of a nest so you can like twist it like pasta a little bit and that sauce that's so good with the butter and the broth and then I want to put a poached egg in the middle.

For our wrap-up questions Kenji, can you waffle asparagus? I'm gonna go with no on that one. I don't know. Can you waffle asparagus? You can but you may not want to. I don't know, can you waffle asparagus? You can, but you may not want to. Can you taco it? You can certainly taco it. I, in fact, I have a taco recipe, asparagus taco recipe on Serious Eats. I feel like the answer to the taco question,

have we had a no yet? I feel like everything is tacoable, right? I mean, tomato soup, but you had this birria suggestion that I did not see coming and was very, most things taco, but you have to think about, like you might, maybe it becomes the sauce, maybe it becomes the topping. But I want to make an asparagus taco. I love doing vegetable tacos.

I'm going to check it out. You can just shove it in a tortilla and it's a delicious taco. Can you fry it in butter in a pan? I hope so. Absolutely, yeah. Does it leftover? As long as you have a pan and butter

and some tortillas, I guess. Or your cold poached is gonna last and last, but you've talked about a few things you like to do with leftover grilled and roasted. Yeah, we've had a lot of leftover discussion today. Kenji, is it gonna come out of our kids' clothes easily? So the answer to that is yes, but it also gets into clothes surprisingly easily.

So we tend to eat asparagus whole, you know, as whole stocks and we put them on the table. And so my toddler, my two-year-old, will just grab fists of it. And they're long and floppy, and they certainly slap around on his tummy and on his clothes, and he gets little asparagus stains on his clothes.

This stuff usually comes out though. No, yeah, it's more like the olive oil and butter or whatever's on it that's getting onto his clothes. But no more than a normal toddler meal, I would say. It's not as bad as like tomato soup or anything. It's slappier than tomato soup, but less staining. I'm actually astounded by the amount of mess my kids can make from the simplest foods,

things you would have never imagined. Yeah. Would have been an issue. Thank you for joining us. If you liked what you hear and you want to find out more about the show or if you have suggestions for upcoming episodes, you can visit us at therecipepodcast.com or follow us on Instagram at Kenji and Deb and shoot us a message. And we now have a phone number where you can call us. It's 202-709-7607 and you can leave us a voicemail.

The recipe is created and co-hosted by Deb Prolman and Jay Kenji Lopez-Alt. Our producers are Jocelyn Gonzalez, Perry Gregory, and Pedro Rafael Rosado of PRX Productions. Edwin Ochoa is the project manager. The executive producer for Radiotopia is Audrey Martovich, and Yori Lissardo is the director of network operations. Cher Delva, Apu Gotay, Emmanuel Johnson and Mike Russo handle our social media. See you next time. Thanks for listening. The recipe with Kenji and Deb is a proud member of Radiotopia from PRX, a network of independent creator-owned listener-supported podcasts.

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