Asparagus and radish salad with caper vinaigrette
Servings: 4
This is a salad that welcomes seasonal replacements: if asparagus isn’t around, you can sub blanched green beans or broccolini bits; flip frisée into any green leaf to hand. Breakfast radishes are the long ones. If you can’t find them, use the regular squat ones. Blue cheese is the bit that stays – the umami punch– and it’s up to you whether that punch is a roquefort right-hander or a blue Castello left hook. Either way, it’s a knockout. This dressing would be beautiful as a light sauce over proteins, tossed through new season baby potatoes, or in a dippy bowl as a vego bagna cauda with crudité vegetables.
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Ingredients
- 250 g (9 oz) asparagus spears
- 1 bunch breakfast radishes, about 250 g (9 oz)
- 1 small frisée lettuce (endive) soaked in cold water
- 80 g (2¾ oz) blue cheese such as roquefort or blue Castello – whatever floats your boat
CAPER VINAIGRETTE
- 1 golden shallot finely diced (about 1 heaped tablespoon)
- ¼ cup 60 ml extra virgin olive oil
- 2 tbsp white wine vinegar
- 1 small garlic clove minced
- 1 heaped teaspoon seeded mustard
- 1 tbsp finely chopped tarragon leaves
- 1 tbsp finely chopped parsley leaves
- 1 tbsp capers rinsed, drained and finely chopped
- ½ tsp salt flakes
- ¼ tsp freshly cracked pepper
Instructions
- Put a saucepan of well-salted water on the stove to boil, then snap off the asparagus ends then cut or snap the spears into 2 cm (3/4 inch) batons on the bias. Drop them into the boiling water to cook for 2 minutes or until lurid green and tender.
- Drain and plunge into cold water to stop the cooking process.
- Finely slice the radishes vertically on a mandolin and drop in a little bowl of cold water until they snap to attention.
- Drain the lettuce and radish, then spin-dry together and lay on paper towel until ready to deploy.
- To make the vinaigrette, combine all of the ingredients in a small bowl and whisk together with a fork. Taste and add salt and pepper if needed.
- Assemble the salad, starting with the lettuce and radish, then add the asparagus and blobs of blue cheese (use a teaspoon to crack into it and keep your fingers from melting into it too much). Drizzle with the caper vinaigrette at the table.
Notes
Recipe from Salad for Days, Murdoch Books
