Celebrating Spring with Garden Bounty

Perhaps by August I will have calmed down about the produce from our garden. But for now, I get exceedingly excited by what's coming up in our garden and in our neighbors: Sandy and Jon's.

Last night, we had friends over for dinner and our appetizer featured radishes, pulled from the garden just ten minutes before our guests pulled down the drive. Earlier in the day, I had blended some softened butter with herbs from the garden. I simply washed off the dirt from the radishes, trimmed them up, and cut them in half vertically. I served them along side the the herbed butter and two kinds of salt: black smoked salt (from Montreal) and some course grained sea salt. They were delicious: crunchy and not too hot.

Straight from my garden, into the kitchen sink, and onto an appetizer platter.

For dinner, I made our family-favorite asparagus lasagne. It comes from a recipe that I pulled from a Gourmet magazine 20 years ago. Ed and I planted 25 asparagus crowns a couple of weeks ago, but it will be a couple of years before we can begin harvesting our own home-grown asparagus. Fortunately, my neighbors grow beautiful asparagus that they sell to restaurants in Louisville. I called Sandy as we headed to church yesterday to see if she could spare some for my dinner guests. I was in luck.

Asparagus is low in calories and is very low in sodium. It is a good source of calcium, magnesium and zinc.
It is high in fiber, protein, vitamin A, B6, C, E, and K, as well as thiamin, riboflavin, ruitn, niacin, folic acis, iron, phosphorus, pottassium, copper,
manganese, selenium, and chromium. Did I mention that is it also delicious? 

Here's the recipe.

ingredients:
4 pounds asparagus trimmed and cut into 1 inch pieces, reserve some of the tips
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
6 .7 x 6.25 inch sheets of instant (no boil) lasagna (from Lotsa Pasta)
1/2 stick of unsalted butter
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1-1/2 cups chicken broth
1/2 cup water
8 ounces mild goat cheese such as Montrachet
1 tablespoon freshly grated lemon zest
1-2/3 cups freshly grated Paramesan
1 cup heavy cream

Note: I sometimes add prosciutto in layers if I’m serving it to meat lovers. Last night, I used some country ham.

preparation:
In each of two shallow baking pans toss half the asparagus stalks with half the oil, coating them well, and roast them in a preheated 500 degree oven, shaking the pans every few minutes for 5-10 minutes, or until they are crisp-tender. Sprinkle the asparagus with salt to taste and let it cool.

In a saucepan melt the butter, add the flour, and cook the roux over moderately low heat, stirring, for 3 minutes. Add the broth and the water in a stream, whisking, simmer the mixture for 5 minutes, and whisk in the goat cheese, the zest, and salt to taste, whisking until the sauce is smooth.

Arrange 2 sheets of the lasagne in a 9x13 inch pan. Spread the sheets with one fourth of the sauce. Top the sauce with one fourth of the asparagus and sprinkle with 1/3 cup of Parmesan. Continue to layer the pasta, the sauce, the asparagus and the Parmesan in the same manner, ending with a sheet of pasta.

In a bowl, beat the cream with a pinch of salt until it holds soft peaks. Arrange the reserved asparagus tips decoratively on the pasta, spoon the cream over the pasta and the asparagus tips, spreading it with the back of the spoon and sprinkle the remaining 1/3 cup Parmesan on top.

Bake the lasagna in the middle of a preheated 350 degrees oven for 20-30 minutes, or until it is golden and bubbling. Let it stand for 10 minutes before serving.

Enjoy!