Asparagus, quails egg salad

I thought I’d do something a little Eastery for this week. Asparagus and quails eggs salad. This is wonderfully simple and a lovely one to serve as a starter or alongside a light lunch. It’s a cold salad too so feel free to make it all ahead of time and just finish it with dressing before serving.

Ingredients

| serves 4 as a starter or side |

• One bunch asparagus

• One box 12 quails eggs

• 1 bag/box pea-shoots, watercress or corn lettuce

• 3 tbsp olive oil

• 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar

• heaped tsp Dijon mustard

• Method

• Wash and dry salad.

• Bring water to the boil and boil quails eggs for 2.5 minutes. Have a bowl of ice water nearby ready. Drain the eggs and plunge into the ice water. Leave for five mins before gently peeling.

• Trim the very woody ends of your asparagus before blanching them for 3-4 minutes. Drain in cold water and leave in cold water until cool. Pat dry using a clean tea towel.

• Arrange salad on a large serving platter followed by the asparagus.

• Whisk together the olive oil, cider vinegar and mustard and drizzle over.

• Slice the quails eggs and dot evenly over the salad followed by a good pinch of flakey sea salt.