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Asparagus a la Creme
Take off about two inches of the head-ends of the asparagus; cut them into pieces about the size of peas, and put them into a saucepan with some cold salt and water. Let them boil about ten minutes; then take them out, drain them, melt a piece of butter the size of an egg in a saucepan, and place them in it. Shake the saucepan over the fire for a few minutes; then sprinkle a dessertspoonful of flour over it, and a small teacupful of boiling water, pepper and salt to taste, and pour over the asparagus the beaten yolks of 2 eggs, mixed with 4 tablespoonfuls of new milk. Let all simmer gently for five or ten minutes; then serve. Time, half an hour. Allow a hundred for a tureenful. Sufficient for five or six persons.
A Victorian velouté-style asparagus dish: tips only, bound with a butter-and-flour sauce enriched with egg yolks. Two things need attention — the quantity, which is given in the old market count, and the egg liaison.
- "Allow a hundred for a tureenful"Asparagus was sold by the hundred spears, not by weight. A hundred spears is several pounds of asparagus, of which only the top two inches is used here — perhaps a pound or so of trimmed tips. Keep the stalks for soup.
- The hinge: do not let the yolks boilOnce the yolks and milk go in, the sauce must stay below a simmer or it will curdle into scrambled egg in thin liquid. Take the pan off direct heat, or hold it just at a tremble, and stir constantly. The "five or ten minutes" of the original may assume a gentler, cooling range top rather than a modern burner.
- Butter the size of an eggAbout 2 oz, or 4 tablespoons. With a dessertspoonful of flour — 2 teaspoons — this is a very loose roux; the yolks do most of the thickening.
- Boiling timeThe recipe gives ten minutes for pieces already cut to the size of peas. Cut that small they need only 2-3 minutes in boiling salted water, then a drain. Overcooked they go grey and collapse into the sauce.
- Start in boiling water, not coldThe instruction to put them in cold water and bring it up adds several minutes of slow cooking. Drop the cut tips straight into water already at a rolling boil.
- A small teacupfulAround 1/2 cup of boiling water. Add it gradually to the floured butter and asparagus so the flour disperses rather than lumping.
- New milkSimply fresh whole milk. Cream may be substituted for a richer result.
- YieldFive or six as a separate vegetable course, as it would have been served. As a side dish alongside a roast it will stretch further.