Quiche with Herbs

Pastry
180g organic spelt flour
50g organic cheddar cheese
50g butter
5 tbsp water

Filling
100g butter
7 - 8 tbsp flour
1/2 cup boiling water
1/2 cup milk
eggs (2 to 5)
75 ggrated parmesan
200g grated cheddar
a big bunch of fresh herbs 

optional: (some quantities given here for an asparagus quiche)
asparagus
shallots

do
Put flour in a bowl. Grate in cheese. Mix. Grate in the butter. Mix (shake the bowl). Slowly add a little water. Knead to a pastry. Add more water as necessary for a firm but not sticky or dry pastry. Cool wrapped in a tea towl.
Chop herbs finely. 

Put butter in a small saucepan on medium heat. Add 7-8 tbsp flour when melted. Fry a short time. Gradually add boiling water while stirring vigorously. Avoid lumps. When the mixture is smooth but still firm, add cold milk while stirring. It will thicken as it gets warmer. Stir from time to time until it starts to bubble. Add more milk if it is too thick and heat it again. Turn off. Stir while cooling.
Beat eggs in the bowl. Add the mixture while beating. Add the parmesan.
Sprinkle a little flour on the tea towel. Roll out the pastry and put it into a buttered 28cm form. Bake at 180°c on the second shelf for 15-20 mins. 

Add some filling to the bottom of the pastry shell. Sprinkle some grated cheddar on it. Add whatever vegies, eg steamed asparagus chunks, or the fried white parts of shallots etc. Mix the herbs into the remaining mixture. Add it on top of the veges. Sprinkle grated cheddar on top. Bake at 180c for 45 - 60 mins till golden. Turn off oven and leave it in for a while.

Remove from form and cool.
Serve individual slices reheated on oven-proof dishes. Refrigerate. Best on the 3rd day.
Goes well with tomato salad and garlic.

Note: the quantities in this recipe can be varied a lot. Use more cheese or herbs. 2 eggs works nicely and so do 5. If you are using asparagus use a lot and add in layers. 5 bunches is delicious.

Green Herb Sauce with Asparagus and Eggs

This sauce is served cold with hot green asparagus and steamed potatoes. Frankfurter Grüne Soße is a seasonal dish served in Frankfurt (Bankfurt). The season all vegetarians are looking foreword to in a meat-centric culture. The traditional Hesse sauce consists of seven fresh herbs: borage, sorrel, garden cress, chervil, chives, parsley, and salad burnet and a variation of hard-boiled eggs, oil, vinegar, mustard and sour cream/yogurt/buttermilk. The bundles of herbs are available from all market stalls in May.

GET
a generous amounts of fresh herbs:
(250g herbs) chopped finely
Garden Cress - Lepidium sativum
Chives - Allium schoenoprasum
Parsley - Petroselinum crispum
Salad Burnet - Sanguisorba minor
Chervil - Anthriscus cerefolium
Sorrel - Rumex acetosa
Borage - Borago officinalis
Possible substitutes: shallots, lovage, lemon balm, and even spinach

Small potatoes
2 hard-boiled eggs
1 bunch of green/white asparagus

Sauce:
Olive oil,
150g sour cream
150g yogurt
1Tsp. mustard
1 teaspoon lemon juice or vinegar
- all organic

DO
The green sauce should stay in the fridge for at least one hour. So coordinate the steaming of the potatoes and asparagus accordingly.

Chop herbs coarsely by hand. Mix the sauce ingredients and add the herbs. Traditionally the egg whites are chopped small and the yolk is mashed before adding it to the sauce. In a hot climate, we serve the eggs separately.
Serve with the asparagus and the steamed potatoes and boiled eggs cut in halves and sprinkle with chopped parsley.

Broad Beans and Green Asparagus with Buckweat Noodles

Get
2 cups of shelled broad beans (Vicia faba)
1 cup of shelled peas
1 cup of snow peas
2 bunches of green asparagus
2 carrots
1 onion
1 cup of flat parsley
5 cloves of minced garlic
some lemon thyme/rosemary
1 bay leaf/ some pepper
olive oil
1 cup of hot stock/water

200 g Buckwheat noodles (Soba)
all organic...

Do
Shell beans. Chop onion finely and fry in olive oil. Cube carrots very small and add. Fry for a while and add 1 cup of hot stock. Add the beans, bay, 2 garlic cloves and some pepper. Cover and simmer for 15 min. Add the asparagus in 2 cm pieces keeping the heads aside. Add most of the peas, parsley and herbs.
Cook the buckwheat pasta.
Simmer vegetables for another 5 min. Test a broad bean to see if it is sufficiently cooked. Before serving, add the asparagus heads, the snow peas, remaining peas, garlic and parsley. Leave covered for a few minutes.

Serve immediately with a vase of nasturtiums (Tropaeolum majus) and citrus blossom for olfactory stimulation.

A hybrid merger of beans used in the Neolithic period in the Mediterranean region and Japanese Soba.

Asparagus quiche

get

2 bunches asparagus
200g spelt flour
50g hard mild cheese
100g butter

4 Tbsp olive oil
6 eggs
4 heaped Tbsp spelt flour.
150g hard mild cheese (cheddar, Bergkäse) (grated finely)
2 Tbsp Parmesan cheese (grated finely)
boiling water
1 cup spelt-almond milk

do

Break the hard bottoms off the asparagus stems. Wash them well.
Steam asparagus until soft. Cool and drain well.

Preheat the oven to 190°c.

Put 200g flour in a bowl. Mix in 50g cheese. Cut in 80g butter. Mix together with hands. Add drops of water and continue kneading until the pastry holds together. Cool.

Heat the olive oil with 20g butter in a small saucepan. When melted mix in 4 Tbsp flour and allow it to cook a little. Add boiling water bit by bit while mixing. The Flour mixture will absorb the water. Continue adding water until the mixture is a thick paste, then gradually stir in the spelt-almond milk. Add enough to make a very thick sauce. Stir occasionally while cooking for about 10 minutes. Then turn of the heat and continue stirring occasionally as it cools.

Roll out the pastry on a cloth. Form it to a pie shell in a 28cm round baking form. Sprinkle a little cheese on the bottom.

Beat the eggs well until foamy. Gradually add the warmish spelt sauce while beating, starting with a small amount. When it is all mixed in, spoon some into the pastry shell to cover the bottom.
Using scissors cut small pieces of asparagus into the pie shell. Discard any woody bottoms. Save the tips for later. Use half the asparagus. Sprinkle some cheese on top and then add more spelt sauce covering the asparagus.
Cut the remaining asparagus on top as before. Sprinkle with Parmesan and then add the remaining spelt sauce evenly on top. Arrange the asparagus tips on top and sprinkle the remaining cheese evenly on them.

Bake the quiche at 190°C on the second shelf from the bottom for 30 minutes.
When you are ready to serve the quiche, bake it for another 60 minutes at 180°C and serve it hot. Test it with a skewer. It can also be eaten cold later.

Asparagus eggs

get

3 sticks raw white asparagus
3 eggs
1 tbsp water
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp butter

do

Wash and peel asparagus, paying special attention to washing the head. It may have sand in it.
Slice them into thin diagonal slices, the head lengthwise.
Fry them in the heated oil - butter mixture till soft.
Beat the eggs with the water. Move the fried asparagus to the edge of the pan. Add the egg mixture. Cut into 2 pieces and flip when it is set.
Serve hot.

Sufficient for 2 people.
This recipe also works with uncooked green asparagus, but it is not necessary to peel it.

Asparagus curry - green and white

This is a vegan non 'ethnic' (transcultural) 'curry' that might have some reminiscence of Thai curries. Do vary the hotness of the chillies and ginger to your requirements. Here the dried chillies and ginger pieces float in the dish and are meant to be removed while eating.

GET
½ kg of white asparagus ( Asparagus officinalis )
½ kg of green asparagus
5 medium potatoes
2 carrots
2 cups of peeled peas
1 onion
2 tomatoes
1 small bulb of garlic
10 cm of fresh ginger root, peeled (NB Ginger safety!)
6-7 dried chilli (Capsicum annuum) or any fresh chilli you are familiar with
2 tins of coconut (milk or cream, organic, no sugar) Or better make your own!
2 x 10 cm pieces of lemongrass, white bottoms only
Some olive oil
1 Tsp agave syrup
10 black peppercorns
1 lime
Fresh coriander
All organic

Rice, Basmati or organic brown rice

DO
Wash the asparagus well, especially the heads have a lot of sand. Be gentle
Snap off the woody bits at the bottom (stock)
Peel the white asparagus with asparagus peeler (stock)
Cut asparagus diagonally into three parts and separate
(Cook bottoms the longest and heads only for a short time)
Chop the onion finely
Peel the potatoes thinly and cut into mouth-size pieces
Peel the carrots and cut into large diagonal slices
Peel tomatoes, chop finely
Peel the garlic

Start a vegetable stock pot
Add the clean asparagus peel and off cuts, onion, carrots offcuts, the peppercorns, half the ginger chunks and lemongrass. Boil

If you cook brown rice, now might be a good time to start cooking it  

Heat olive oil, fry onion golden, add the ginger and carrot pieces, fry, add potatoes, stir. Add the tomatoes, stir. Then pour 2 cups of the stock through a sieve and pour onto the vegetables. Add the chillies. Cover and boil for 5 min. then add the coconut and garlic cloves. Add half the peas and the bottom bits of the asparagus. Cover and simmer for another 10 min. Add some more of the stock but do not let it get too liquid! Add the top bits of the asparagus, the remaining peas and some of the coriander leaves. Simmer another 5 - 10 min. Add lime juice and sprinkle with fresh coriander before serving.
Should you have too much stock, you might want to use it to cook the rice for day two of the curry.

Images:
Carl Eduard Schuch, 1888 (?) Bunch of asparagus, glass and clay pot

Carole's chili seeds, organic seedsaver

Carl Eduard Schuch, 1884/85, Apples on white with asparagus and jug

Asparagus with Parmesan

Get
1 kg of Asparagus ( Asparagus officinalis )
Some Parmesan (Parmigiano-Reggiano)
Some good Olive Oil
Some Parseley

Do
Wash the asparagus
Snap off the woody bits at the bottom
Peel with asparagus peeler
Keep peel and bottom bits for a vegetable stock (in fridge)
Boil water in steamer and add vegetables
Simmer at low heat for 15 minutes
Shave Parmesan finely

Arrange asparagus on warm platter. Dribble some of the olive oil on them.
Sprinkle with the Parmesan flakes. Add some chopped parseley around the edge of plate.

Serve with fresh potatoes or any other dish.

Should you have picked some wild green asparagus (Ornithogalum pyrenaicum), steam for a shorter time or serve raw.