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Asparagus with Eggs
2 bunches asparagus 4 eggs 2 tablespoons melted butter 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/8 teaspoon pepper Cook the asparagus, cut off the tender tops and lay them on a buttered pie dish, seasoning with salt and pepper and melted butter. Beat the eggs just enough to break the yolks, pour over the asparagus and bake eight minutes in a moderate oven. Serve with slices of boiled ham. "Asparagus in Ambush" 2 bunches cooked asparagus 1 cup scalded milk 2 eggs 1 tablespoon butter 1 tablespoon Gold Medal flour 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/8 teaspoon pepper 6 rolls Cut off the tops of the rolls to serve as covers. Remove the crumb, dust the shells and covers with melted butter and brown in the oven. Make a white sauce of the milk, butter and flour. Cut the tender part of the asparagus fine, cook a few minutes in the white sauce; fill the rolls with the mixture, place on the tops and serve hot.
Two related dishes: baked asparagus under barely-beaten eggs, and the same vegetable creamed and hidden inside hollowed rolls. Both assume asparagus already boiled tender before it goes near the oven.
- A moderate ovenSomewhere around 350 to 375F. Eight minutes at that heat will set the whites of four eggs poured in a thin layer over asparagus, but the yolks stay soft. If you want them firm, expect closer to 15 minutes, and pull the dish while the centre still trembles.
- Two bunchesRoughly 2 lb of asparagus as sold today, yielding perhaps 1 lb of usable tips and upper stalks. Both dishes serve four to six.
- Cook the asparagus firstThe recipe gives no time, and period cookbooks generally boiled asparagus far longer than we would now. Three to four minutes in salted water, until the stalks bend but do not flop, is enough; drain it well or the egg dish will weep.
- A buttered pie dishAny shallow ceramic or glass baking dish. The point is a wide, shallow layer so the eggs cook quickly and evenly rather than turning into a deep custard.
- The eggs, barely beaten"Just enough to break the yolks" is deliberate. The finished dish should show streaks of yolk and white rather than a uniform scramble, so stop stirring early.
- An unused ingredient in the second recipeThe Ambush list calls for 2 eggs, but the method never uses them. Presumably they were meant to enrich the sauce; the flour-and-milk sauce works perfectly well without them.
- The rollsFirm crusty dinner rolls, not soft supermarket buns, which collapse once filled. Hollow them, brush inside and out with melted butter, and crisp at 375F for 8 to 10 minutes; fill only at the moment of serving or the shells soften.
- White sauce proportionsOne tablespoon each of butter and flour to a cup of milk is a thin sauce, which is what you want for coating cut asparagus. If it seems loose, let it simmer a minute or two longer rather than adding more flour.
The Gold Medal Flour cook book was published by the Washburn-Crosby milling company of Minneapolis, and like most flour-company booklets of the period it exists to put the brand name into ordinary recipes, which is why a single tablespoon of thickening in the second dish is specified as "Gold Medal flour." "Asparagus in Ambush" was a stock name in American cookbooks around the turn of the century for creamed vegetables served in hollowed bread cases, the ambush being the vegetable concealed under the roll's replaced lid; the same conceit appears with mushrooms, oysters and sweetbreads. Both dishes belong to the brief season when asparagus was a genuine luxury of April and May rather than a year-round import.