Quiche with asparagus

Quiche with asparagus
Yield: 8 servings, 1 slice each

Ingredients:
1 recipe French Tart Dough (see note below)
1/2 lb or 8 oz asparagus, which is about 10-12 whole spears
6-8 large eggs
1/4 cup milk
1/2 cup Emmentaler or Swiss shredded
1/2 cup Gruyere cheese, shredded
salt and pepper to taste
1/8 tsp nutmeg

Directions:
1. Prepare the tart dough for a 9" round pie plate or pan.  See note below. This can be done 1 day ahead of time.
2. Preheat the oven to 350º F or 180º C.
3. Bring a large pot of water to boil. Once boiling, add the asparagus whole and cook for 2 minutes.
4. Remove the asparagus from the boiling water and place under cold water or plunge the spears into ice water to blanch them and stop them from cooking any further. When cool enough to handle cut them in half in the middle, and then split them down the center so that the halves can lie on top of the quiche.
5. Put all the eggs in a large mixing bowl, add the milk, and beat together until well incorporated.
6. Add the shredded cheese to the eggs, and season with salt and pepper, and nutmeg.
7. Pour the quiche batter on top of the prepped tart dough.
8. Carefully arrange the asparagus halves on top. Bake the quiche for 40 minutes until lightly golden on top and cooked through. Allow to cool and set about 30 minutes before serving. This quiche pairs nicely with a small side salad.

Note:
This French tart dough recipe is one of my favorites. The instructions, comments, and pictures are superbly presented so I have opted out of recreating it here.  The recipe from the link is good for an 8" or 9" pan, but anything larger than that and you will find that the dough doesn't quite make it up the sides. To me this method of tart dough is much easier to prepare than pie dough, and much more forgiving if learning for the first time. The method is to place all of the tart dough ingredients (except the flour) into the oven until the mixture becomes piping hot. Then flour is stirred into the hot mixture and the entire thing transforms itself into a dough ball that can easily be placed into a pie plate or fluted pan.

Flemish-style white asparagus

First off, I am in love with the Belgian cooking show Dagelijkse Kost. In love! The online videos are useful in language learning, it focuses heavily on Belgian sourced ingredients, and the recipes are a great way to learn more about modernized Belgian cuisine. Take for instance, asperges op Vlaamse wijze, white asparagus lightly poached then topped with a parsley-egg-butter sauce. The show has weekly menus accompanied with videos, recipes, shopping tips, and price estimates.

My friend, Nico, was impressed with my ability to understand Chef Jeroen Meus's Leuvense dialect, but this is precisely the kind of Dutch I'm learning. I attempt to speak Belgian Dutch - er - Flemish. Plus, 3 minute video segments on cooking are perfect. The context is largely understandable, I can hear and listen to the way the ingredients and methods are supposed to sound like (trust me onion, ui, felt like a god-awful tongue twister). 

One quick thing on dialects. While all Belgian Flemish schoolchildren learn standard Dutch/Nederlands, one will find that dialects are the form of spoken language. They vary from town to town, and by region. So, if you are from West Flanders the dialect there (although they still speak Dutch/Flemish) tends to skip a lot of sounds, and if you are from Limburg, you tend to make the rolling "rrrr" sound in the back of your throat, but somehow not a guttural "rrrrr." Whereas in Leuven, it's a mixture of geographical placement (being so close to Brussels) that the Flemish in a way sounds like a cross between the soft intonations of French together with an English person speaking very softly (totally not accurate). It has a wave-like rhythm, and I do realize, I'm beating this whole thing into the ground, but basically as a language learner, I'm learning standard proper Dutch at the university, but no one understands me here - and I'm sure if I were placed in Holland, no one would understand me there either. I speak most efficiently among other non-native language learners, and if you try speaking Flemish/Dutch with locals they'll often have difficulty understanding you, realize you are a foreigner, and automatically switch to English. This is frustrating to language learners, but is truly a Belgian Flemish trait. They never expect you to fully converse, always appreciate the attempt to speak, and because they know and speak English completely fluently, will do this to accommodate you. 

Anyways, learning the language here has been fun. I've just completed exams for Level 2, and feel like I've gotten everything I wanted out of the courses. I'm able to make simple appointments or requests over the phone, can buy international tickets at the train station, and with a little help of cooking shows, can now pronounce most of the fruits and vegetables I buy at the city markets.

I made this recipe from Dagelijkse Kost, a cooking show on the Belgian TV channel Eén.  I won't lie, I had to watch the video several times, and maybe hit Google Translate once. Enjoy or as they say here, eet smakelijk!

Asperges op Vlaamse wijze

Flemish-style Asparagus

Serves 2

Ingredients:

1 dozen or more fresh white asparagus

3 eggs, hard-boiled (1 tsp vinegar if hard boiling them)

1/2 cup chopped curly parsley

salt and pepper to taste

fresh nutmeg (probably less than 1/8 tsp)

1/2 cup butter or 100 g butter

Directions

1. Add the eggs, vinegar, and enough water to a small saucepan. Bring it to a light boil and cook the eggs 10 minutes. Add the eggs to a cold water bath to cool. Peel when cool enough to handle.
2. Lightly wash the asparagus and set aside. Take a vegetable peeler, and while holding the tip, peel all the way around.
3. Set the peeled asparagus in a pot filled with cold lightly-salted water. Heat the pot over medium, being careful not to boil. Once the water simmers, turn it off, and let the asparagus sit in the warm water for 5-10 minutes. Then set the asparagus on a plate until ready to use.
4. Place the butter in a small saucepan, and heat it until it simmers. You'll be clarifying the butter, so skim off the white milk solids on the top and set aside. Meanwhile, peel the eggs.
5. Mash the eggs coarsely with a potato masher. Add in parsley, butter, salt and pepper, and nutmeg. If too thick add in a 1-2 tbsp of water until the sauce has a nice consistency.
6. Set the asparagus on plates and top each with half of the sauce.

Since I served this for dinner, I used up the discarded buttery milk solids by frying up some veggie sausages, and although definitely not part of the cuisine, it rounded out the dish nicely.  

Eet smakelijk!