Asparagus with Parmesan Cheese and Fried Eggs

You know, there are a lot of great cookbooks released every day and most of them contain updates and new approaches to classic dishes and/or new flavor combinations that are both interesting and exciting.  However, there is something to be said for the timelessness of classic cookbooks.  So, from time to time, I’m going to highlight recipes that may have fallen out of fashion or slipped through the cracks from cookbooks past.  Marcella Hazan’s classic cookbook, The Classic Italian Cookbook is a great place to start.  I love the fact that the tagline beneath the title of this cookbook is:  The art of Italian cooking and the Italian art of eating.  Somehow lost in the various mounds of recipes we forget that eating and enjoyment of food is an art in and of itself but that wasn’t lost on Marcella Hazan.

This dish presents the best of Italian cooking in that it celebrates seasonality and simplicity while at the same time combining those simple flavors into something much bigger than its’ individual components.  This dish is traditionally served as a starter but certainly could suffice as a main course.  The book suggests serving two eggs per person as a main or one egg as a starter.  In my copy of the book the exact recipe can be found on pages 356-357.  The recipe below deviates from the recipe as written just slightly as she suggest to use an asparagus steamer and I skipped that step.  Also, I reduced the amount of butter used to fry the eggs.  I also reduced the roasting temperature from 450 degrees to 425 as I didn’t steam the vegetable prior to roasting so it needed a bit more time in the oven.  At 450 degrees, the cheese would have melted very quickly and burned before the asparagus was cooked through.  Other than that, everything else remained the same.  Recipe follows after the jump…

Ingredients:

2 Pounds asparagus (thin spears are best if you skip steaming them in the beginning)

8 Eggs

3-4 Tablespoons butter

Grated Parmesan to taste

Freshly ground pepper

Instructions:

• Preheat oven to 425 degrees.  Layer the asparagus spears in a pan or baking sheet between beds of grated Parmesan cheese.  Sprinkle a bit of Parmesan over the top.  Dot the top with a few pats of butter and place in the oven until the asparagus has cooked through and the cheese melted and slightly caramelized, about 10-15 minutes.
• In the meantime, fry the eggs by placing in either a nonstick skillet or cast iron pan over medium high heat.   Place a small amount of butter in the pan and place the egg on top of that.  Allow the egg to cook through, about 1.5-2 minutes per egg.  (As an aside, I suggest cracking the eggs into a small bowl and then sliding the eggs into the pan.  That way, if the yolk breaks when you crack it, you can use it in another way and crack another that is in tact to fry.)

To serve:  Place roasted asparagus on a plate or platter and then carefully place eggs over that.  Sprinkle the whole thing with a bit more Parmesan cheese and a grind or two of freshly cracked black pepper.  Add a bit of flaky sea salt if you prefer…or skip it as the Parmesan is salty too.  Finish by spooning just a touch of the butter/juices from the roasting pan over the top of everything.  Enjoy while hot or warm.