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Cream Of Asparagus
2 bunches of asparagus; 1 small onion; 1 pint milk; 1/4 pint rich cream; 1 tablespoon butter; 1 tablespoon flour; salt and pepper. Cut off the asparagus tips and boil separately to use as salad. Cut the stalks in short pieces to facilitate straining, boil in one pint of salted water until tender; mash and strain, with the water in which they were cooked, through a colander. Lift the tips carefully from the water, keeping them unbroken. Add this water to the asparagus pulp, put it with the hot milk.
A straightforward puree soup built on asparagus stalk trimmings, with the tips saved for another dish. The written method stops before the thickening and finishing, so the last stages have to be handled by ordinary practice.
- What a bunch weighsA market bunch of asparagus in this period ran roughly 1 to 1 1/2 lb, so two bunches is about 2 to 3 lb untrimmed. The stalks alone, after the tips are cut off, will give you enough pulp for four to six servings.
- The quarter pint of creamThat is half a cup. Combined with a pint of milk it makes a soup of moderate richness; today's heavy cream will read heavier than the original probably intends, and a light cream or half-and-half is likely nearer to what was meant by "rich cream."
- Butter and flourOne tablespoon of each makes a thin roux, cooked two or three minutes without colouring before the hot liquid goes in. It is the only thickening here, so the soup will be light rather than velouté-thick.
- The onionNo treatment is specified. One common handling is to simmer it whole or halved in the milk to infuse and then lift it out before combining, rather than leaving it in the puree.
- StrainingA colander will pass the pulp but hold back the woody fibre, which is the point of cutting the stalks short first. A food mill with the medium plate does the same job faster; a blender alone will not remove fibre and the soup will be stringy.
- Cooking the stalksBoil until a knife goes through easily, usually 15 to 20 minutes depending on thickness. The cooking water carries most of the flavour and goes into the soup, so salt it lightly rather than heavily.
- The tipsBoil them separately for 3 to 5 minutes only, until just tender, and cool them promptly if they are going into salad. Held in hot water they overcook and lose colour within minutes.
- FinishingAdd the cream off direct heat at the end and warm through without boiling, since boiled cream may separate. Season after the cream goes in, since the asparagus water is already salted.