Rich greens

I think lockdown has broken my stomach. I've not exactly stinted myself through All This, but it's hard to work up a lather of gastronomic frenzy when you're just cooking for you, and you will have to wash the whole goddamn thing up later and when your kitchen is really starting to annoy you. It's limited me down to more basic portions. I nearly exploded last weekend after a lavish cook at home steak box delivery, and now I've almost been defeated by asparagus pasta. 

Asparagus pasta! It should be my absolute comfort zone. And this is nearly-vegan week, and things are intended to be quiet and gently healthy recipes. This one is exceptionally simple, to the point where I'm cooking it from scratch both nights rather than doing leftovers. But it's rich (...not very vegan tbh...) and lavish with good ingredients. 

This isn't meant to be an asparagus dish, the original recipe is for spinach and it might be a tad less daunting then, as the wilty spinach would soften the sauce. But the notes said I could make it asparagus, so OBVIOUSLY I made it asparagus. 

It's for wide pasta, tagliatelle or similar. Cook that, and cook your asparagus lightly (if you're doing spinach, don't cook it, just use the heat of the pasta to wilt it). Drain but save a splosh of the pasta water.

 

Meanwhile: melt some butter and add in a crushed garlic clove, very gently warming.

 

Randomly grab a handful of wild garlic since you have some (never a bad leftover). Chop some hazelnuts, grate some parmesan, chop some parsley. 

 

Mix all that lot (bar some of the parmesan) into the butter and garlic mix, add the drained pasta, swirl a tidge of pasta water through to make it more saucy. Serve, scoff. Pause halfway through and realise you're pretty full. Cheese, butter, nuts, pasta: they defeat your parsley/garlic/asparagus health efforts. They laugh in your face. But they are delicious.