Spectacular souffle!

One dish that has always intimidated me was the souffle. In fact, until recently, I didn't even own any souffle dishes; fortunately that has changed.

Not too long ago, my son and his friend and I went to the D Bar Dessert Bar in Denver. My son tried the "Booz-flay," their Grand Marnier souffle (I sampled some...it was quite tasty), then during a recent episode of Master Chef, the home cooks were making souffles for a challenge, and my son asked me if I'd ever made a souffle (I hadn't), and why I hadn't. I really didn't have any good reason other than not owning the dishes, so I decided to remedy the situation.

I picked up the dishes at Peppercorn in Boulder, and pulled the recipes from The Joy of Cooking, my go-to resource when I'm making things I've never made before but for which I need a recipe. I decided to get over my souffle making phobia by making both an entree souffle and a dessert souffle for the same meal; I opted for the Cheese Cockaigne savory souffle and the chocolate souffle for dessert.

The instructions for both were straightforward and easy to follow, which was great. In fact, I realized that making a souffle is actually much easier than I thought it was going to be. My biggest concern was the possible effect that altitude might have on the souffles, but the elevation of Denver proved to have a negligible effect (had to cook them a bit longer is all).

Both souffles turned out light and airy and incredibly rich. I served the cheese souffle with a side of a bowl of organic grape tomatoes to balance out the dish and add some acidity to the meal. The next time I make a cheese souffle, I think I may tinker with the seasonings a bit, since I do feel the cheese souffle as it was written could have benefited from a bit of an "oomph," as it were. It wasn't bad, just a bit...bland (sort of). Some garlic or herbs would have done well.

The chocolate souffle was equally rich, especially when topped with the vanilla sauce as recommended in the book, which added a sweetness to it as well. Next time I make this one, I'll use a darker chocolate (this was almost milk chocolate) and perhaps a touch of cinnamon then top it with a whipped cream or the like.

So...the lesson here: while souffles are definitely temperamental and require careful attention, they aren't quite as difficult as they are made out to be, and they are definitely worth the effort.

Asparagus awesomeness

Spring/early summer is one of my favorite food seasons (okay, let's be honest here, I don't think I have a least favorite food season, but anyway....) because with it comes asparagus. Asparagus is a fairly new food to the list of foods I would eat, simply because until 3 or so years ago, the only time I'd had it, it was served to me rather mushy, slimy, and essentially flavorless. I was offered some by the ladies of Jay Hill Farm while at my local farmers' market a few years back; initially I declined, but then after talking with them about how to prepare it and  basically being "dared" to try it again, I bought some, took it home, cooked it according to their directions...and went back and bought some every week after that until asparagus season was over. As with many foods in my diet, I generally only eat asparagus seasonally, which means I get it for roughly a month to a month and a half, so I enjoy it as often as I can.

Typically I either grill the asparagus or sautee it in Meyer lemon infused olive oil and butter with a little fresh ground black pepper, but this season I was given one recipe and came up with my own method of serving asparagus that have only added depth and dimension to what is now one of my favorite vegetables.

The first is a recipe that comes from the previously mentioned Jay Hill Farm. Asparagus with spring garlic and Asiago is simple, easy, and quick to make, and is a nicely complex dish to serve. The link to the recipe is here, the entire dish takes 15 minutes to make, which is a huge bonus when pressed for time at home, and the ingredient list doesn't necessarily require purchasing anything out of the ordinary, aside from maybe the Asiago cheese:

1 lb. Fresh Asparagus
1 bunch Spring Garlic
1 Tbsp. Olive Oil
1 Tbsp. Butter
Salt & Pepper to taste
1 to 2 Tbsp. Freshly grated Asiago Cheese

For this recipe, I picked up a small brick of Asiago and grated it myself, which I would definitely recommend doing, simply because there is a definite taste difference between freshly grated and pre-grated cheese of any sort. As you can likely tell from the picture, I did grate a bit more than the 1-2 tablespoons in the recipe, but I love Asiago, so I admittedly went a little crazy.

My next method of serving asparagus is a simple sauteed asparagus with hollandaise sauce and sliced fresh strawberries. I love the fact that asparagus season and strawberry season overlap, giving me the opportunity to have this sweetly savory side dish that I served with grilled pork chops. I would definitely not use frozen strawberries for this dish: the flavor and texture just wouldn't even come close to the same. My recipe for the hollandaise sauce comes from the ever-indispensable Joy of Cooking, a book that should be a staple in every cook's kitchen. I used the quick whole-egg hollandaise recipe simply for convenience and not wanting to deal with separating the eggs (I admit that I used an organic, bottled lemon juice for this recipe). NOTE: if you've never made hollandaise sauce before, it is HUGELY important that once you start, you don't stop until it is ready to pour onto the plate. Hollandaise requires constant stirring and will overcook and curdle quickly. If it does, you can rescue it by putting it into a blender, but it's better to not have to do that in the first place.

So what are you waiting for? Asparagus season is almost over! Get cooking!