Asparagus Recipes... pasta

Part of this blog is supposed to be about what we (I) cook as the vegetable garden is harvested! We're already past one crop and I haven't posted a recipe yet... sorry!

The asparagus was delightful... I picked about a pound a week, which was just perfect. I kept most of it and passed a few spears along to willing recipients. Really - if you have a spot for asparagus, it's 100% worth it. The first year is a little work as you slowly have to fill in the trenches, but after that it's a very easy crop. Refer to this post about planting and growing it. I have had no problems with pest and disease, which is partly because it comes so early in the season. How can you beat picking fresh asparagus once a week for 6 weeks!

We made a few new recipes using the asparagus which I will post over the next few days. This is one of my favorites: Pasta with asparagus & pancetta. I've adapted it from a few recipes that I've seen around - the main inspiration from a recipe out of Bon Appetit sometime in the spring of 2010.

12 oz pasta - shells or something absorbs yummy sauce!
3 oz pancetta, diced
1 lb asparagus, trimmed and cut into 1-inch pieces on the diagonal
2 cups of peas - fresh shelled or frozen
1 bunch scallions, white & lt green parts thinly sliced
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1/2 cup Parmesan or Romano, plus extra for serving
1/2 cup of ricotta
3 tbspns olive oil
3 tbspns fresh lemon juice
zest from one lemon
1/4 cup of fresh parsley or tarragon is good with this too

 To cook ingredients: 

• Cook pasta according to directions, drain, reserve 1 cup of water and put pasta back into pot.
• Heat 12 inch nonstick skillet over medium heat. Cook pancetta until nice and crispy; remove with slotted spoon to a bowl. 
• Add asparagus to pan, saute for 3 mins. Add peas & scallions, cook for about 2 mins. Add garlic until fragrant, 30 secs. Remove from heat. 

To assemble:

• Add vegetable mixture to pasta in the pot, about a 1/4 cup of the reserved pasta water, 1/2 cup of cheese, olive oil, lemon juice & lemon zest. Mix together and season liberally with salt & pepper. Add ricotta by the spoon full and mix to desired consistency, thinning with more pasta water as needed. Add fresh herbs and 2/3 of pancetta. Transfer to serving plates and sprinkle with remaining pancetta and cheese. 

This is the delicious dish you will have!

 ** This pasta is easy and great to make throughout the summer as more vegetables come in. You could use summer squash, cook it until there is still a little crunch left. Add peppers, eggplant and anything else you have! I'll post as we use this pasta recipe with other vegetables.

May Flowers...

The flowers in my garden are just as important and rewarding as the vegetables! I am all about having fresh cut flowers around the house as much as possible. I've managed to get it so that I have them for most of the year from cutting flowers in the summer to Holiday arrangements and then forcing flowering trees come winter.

Of course, I have a favorite... I wait for 11 months out of the year for my peonies! When I first showed up at this house & property it was completely overgrown and overwhelming. During that first spring I had one thought "thank God it isn't me keeping up with this!" Famous last words. As overgrown as it was, you can imagine my delight when come early June, I was rewarded with the most incredible peony border. There is a saying that peonies are no fuss, and the fact that they had been neglected for 8 years and were still incredible, shows that. I've tended to them, split them up some and added to them. It's taken a few years for the ones that I dug out to start producing many buds again. This year has to be a banner year - I'm cutting bunches and bunches about every 5 days. I'll be sad when they're gone, and then rewarded again as all the rest of my annuals and perennials start to burst open.

All those gorgeous buds ready to burst open around May 20 (which was very early!):

 

A shot as the early light pink ones are open and the fuchsia are starting to open - I do not know what kind they are. There were 3 varieties here and I added 2. 

One of the bouquets that I get to fill the house with for 3-4 weeks!

 

There are are 2 Siberian Iris here, this purple and yellow is in the main garden. Once I cleaned the garden out, it grew like crazy so I split it up all over the place! 

 Living across the street from a garden center/ farm stand has quite a few benefits! One being that Cindy, the owner, hates to get rid of the end of the season flowers so she ends up loading up my car! This was a flower that I never knew existed and now I don't know what I would do without it at this time of year! She gave me a flat 2 years ago so that I have it scattered about - I love the variegated flower! It's called Malva:

Not to be left out: my poppy! I get a good 6 or 7 buds now. This year we dug up my Mom's and put it in my garden so hopefully next year I'll have them throughout. 

About 2.5 years ago, we thought my parents would not be in their house for another season so we dug up as much as we could and transplanted to a variety of places. I was fortunate enough to receive all of my Mom's roses. We put most of them in my veg garden. This is my favorite. Finally this year I was rewarded with many of the gorgeous, bubble-gum pink flowers with the most delightful scent. Hoping I'll be able to get it to flower like this again later this summer. Roses are something I'm still figuring out. I have black spot all over them right now so they lost leaves. I've fed and treated them with a systemic, which was likely a little late hence the problems.

The vegetable garden is about 95% set. I'll post about what went in there along with some of the preventative measures I'm taking. I've already spotted a few unfriendly guests, which means I have my work cut out for me this season.