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Fresh Asparagus, Sauce Bearnaise
Clip off the ends and neatly scrape two branches very fresh asparagus, thoroughly wash in plenty of cold water, tie in three bunches, then plunge in a gallon boiling water with a tablespoon salt. Cover pan and boil twenty-five minutes, lift up, drain on a cloth, then lay on a dish with a folded napkin over, and serve with a Bearnaise sauce separately.
A plain French service of asparagus, and the only thing standing between it and a good plate is the boiling time. Everything else translates directly.
- Twenty-five minutes is the problemModern asparagus, even thick spears, is done in 4 to 6 minutes in salted boiling water — the tip of a knife should meet slight resistance at the base. Twenty-five minutes reflects older, coarser, field-grown asparagus cut at full size; today it produces grey, collapsing stalks. Cook uncovered rather than covered, which helps keep the green.
- "Two branches"'Branch' here is likely standing in for a bunch or bundle rather than a single spear, since the gallon of water and the instruction to tie into three bunches make no sense for two stalks. On that reading you are dealing with something on the order of a couple of pounds, though the recipe gives no weight.
- ScrapingScraping meant taking the fibrous skin off the lower half of each stalk with a knife. A vegetable peeler does it faster. With thin modern spears you can skip it entirely and simply snap or trim the woody base.
- The waterA gallon of water for this quantity is generous, and generous water keeps the temperature from dropping when the asparagus goes in, so the spears cook fast. A single tablespoon of salt to the gallon is on the light side by modern taste; season the water more heavily if you want the stalks seasoned through.
- Tying in bunchesWorth doing. Bundles can be lifted out together at the exact moment they are done and drained upright, and they do not tangle or break in the pan. Kitchen string, tied twice, near the tips and near the base.
- Draining on a clothThis is not fussiness. Wet asparagus thins and slides off a hollandaise-family sauce, so blot the bundles well and cut the strings before plating. The folded napkin over the dish is period service — a clean tea towel keeps the heat in just as well.
- Sauce béarnaiseSauce béarnaise asks you to turn to a sauce recipe elsewhere in the book. A classic béarnaise is a reduction of vinegar, shallot and tarragon stems, finished with egg yolks and butter over gentle heat, then chopped herbs. It must be held warm, never hot, or it breaks. Serve it in a separate boat, as instructed.
- YieldThe recipe gives no yield. Taken as two bunches, it would serve about four as a first course, more as a side dish.
Asparagus served whole under a napkin with a sauce apart is the classic French restaurant presentation of the late nineteenth century, and it appears in this book for that reason: The International Cook Book (1906) was assembled by Alexander Filippini, long of Delmonico's in New York, and much of it is the working vocabulary of the professional dining room rather than the household. Béarnaise itself is generally traced to the Pavillon Henri IV at Saint-Germain-en-Laye in the 1830s, the name traditionally explained as a nod to Henri IV's native Béarn rather than to any Béarnais dish; by Filippini's day it was standard equipment, pairing tarragon and vinegar against butter. The long boiling time is the real period marker. Asparagus then was a brief spring luxury, often thick, sandy and peeled, sold by the bunch and cooked until thoroughly soft — the taste for crisp, barely-cooked green vegetables belongs to the second half of the twentieth century.