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Asparagus Soup
Take a hundred heads of asparagus. Cut away the hard, tough part, and boil the rest till tender. Drain them, throw half into cold water until the soup is nearly ready, and press the other half through a hair sieve. Stir the pressed asparagus into three pints of stock, which has not been flavoured with any other vegetable. Boil it, and add salt, pepper, and a small lump of sugar. Cut the remaining heads of asparagus into pieces the size of peas. Put them into the soup for a few minutes and serve. If necessary, colour with a little spinach green. Time, about an hour. Probable cost of asparagus, 2s. 6d. a hundred in full season. Sufficient for six or eight persons.
A clear asparagus soup built on stock rather than cream, with half the spears puréed and half held back as garnish. The method is sound; only the units and the colouring need translating.
- A hundred headsAsparagus was sold by the hundred spears, tied in bundles, rather than by weight. Modern equivalents are approximate, since spear size varied a good deal; reckon on several pounds of trimmed asparagus for the quantity here.
- Three pints of stockImperial pints, so 60 fl oz, roughly 1.7 litres. The stipulation that it carry no other vegetable flavour points to a plain stock rather than a mirepoix-based one that would muddy the asparagus.
- Hair sieveA fine horsehair drum sieve, the standard tool for fine purées; hair was often preferred to metal, which was said to taint or discolour acidic mixtures. A food mill fitted with the fine plate, or a blender followed by a fine chinois, does the same work faster; press hard to leave the fibres behind.
- Do not overcook the garnishThe reserved spears go into hot soup for a few minutes only. They have already been boiled tender, and a second long simmer turns them grey and stringy. Cutting them pea-sized while cold and firm is easier than doing it hot.
- The cold-water plungeThe reserved half sits in cold water until the soup is nearly ready, which stops it cooking on and helps hold its colour. Drain it well before it goes in, or the soup thins.
- Spinach greenA Victorian kitchen colouring made by pounding raw spinach, straining the juice and heating it gently so the green coagulates for skimming off. Modern cooks can simply blend a handful of blanched spinach leaves into the purée, or leave the soup its natural pale colour.
- A small lump of sugarLump sugar was cut from a loaf and sizes varied; a teaspoon is a reasonable modern reading of 'a small lump'. It counters the slight bitterness of the stalks rather than sweetening the soup.
- Yield and timingSix to eight as a first course. The hour given is generous; with trimmed spears the whole thing takes about thirty-five minutes.
Cassell's belongs to the last decades of the nineteenth century, when English asparagus was still a seasonal market-garden crop grown on the light soils around London and sold by the hundred spears rather than by weight. The 2s. 6d. quoted here is for the height of the season; forced asparagus earlier in the year cost considerably more. The structure, half the vegetable pureed for body and half reserved as a garnish, is of a piece with the French repertoire of potages, and the direction that the stock carry no other vegetable flavour marks it as a dish meant to taste of one thing only.