Asparagus and fig salad with green sauce!

Asparagus season is in full bloom. Today I want to show you a recipe for a tasty and healthy green veggie salad. It is an ideal solution for people striving to lose excess weight. This salad makes a great breakfast but also a light lunch at work or even dinner. Green vegetables will provide us with a fair amount of folic acid, magnesium and vitamin C. Green vegetables are also rich in chlorophyll, which is a strong antioxidant.

Preparation

I washed the asparagus, snapped off the woody ends and boiled it for about 8 minutes in slightly salted water (it’s best not to overcook it). I put washed spinach on a plate (dried with kitchen towels) and when the asparagus was ready I moved it onto the plate. I washed the figs, melted coconut oil in a pan and slightly warmed the fruit.

Sauce

I mixed all the ingredients until smooth and added some pine nuts at the end. You can also opt for pumpkin or sunflower seeds.

The salad can be served with avocado.

Snapping the ends beats cutting them

Hold a spear at both ends and bend it: it breaks exactly where the woody part stops and the tender part begins. Every spear in a bunch is different, so a knife cutting all of them at the same height either leaves fibrous stubs on some or throws away good asparagus from others.

Green asparagus does not need peeling, unlike white, which is the reason this recipe skips that step entirely. If the spears are thick and the skin looks tough near the base, a peeler over the bottom third is enough.

Eight minutes, and what overcooking costs

Eight minutes suits medium spears in gently boiling salted water. Thin ones need four to five, thick ones up to ten, and the way to tell is a knife tip meeting slight resistance at the thickest point rather than sliding straight through.

The warning in the recipe is the important part. Asparagus goes from firm to limp in about a minute, and once it does nothing brings it back. The colour is the tell: bright green means ready, dull olive means a minute too long. For a salad served warm on spinach, take the spears out slightly firmer than you would want to eat them, because they keep cooking on the plate.

Warming the figs rather than frying them

The figs spend only a moment in the melted coconut oil, just long enough to warm through. Their sugars caramelise quickly and a fig left in a hot pan collapses into jam, which is not what this salad wants: it wants the fruit holding its shape with softened, sweeter flesh.

Halve or quarter them, put the cut face down first, and give it under a minute. Out of season, strawberries replace the figs as the recipe notes, and they need no pan at all.

The sauce is a spinach dressing, not a vinaigrette

Two handfuls of baby spinach go into the sauce as well as onto the plate, and that is what makes it green and thick rather than a thin oil-and-lemon dressing. Blend the spinach with the olive oil, honey, mustard and lemon juice until completely smooth, then stir the pine nuts in afterwards so they stay whole.

Make it just before serving. Blended raw spinach darkens within a few hours and the fresh green turns drab, which shows on a plate like this one. If you need to make it ahead, keep it in a jar filled to the top with as little air as possible, and use it the same day.

Putting it together

Dry the spinach properly, as the recipe says: a wet leaf cannot hold a dressing and the sauce slides to the bottom of the plate. Spinach first, then the warm asparagus, then the figs, then the sauce spooned over rather than tossed through, so the leaves do not wilt under it.

Avocado goes on at the end, sliced, and it turns this from a starter into a meal. Dress the salad at the table, not in the kitchen. If you would rather have seasonal meals like this one planned into the week with a shopping list, that is what the Diet & Training by Ann app does.

Anna Lewandowska

Asparagus and fig salad with green sauce

Boiled green asparagus and warmed figs served on baby spinach with a blended spinach dressing, pine nuts and avocado.

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Prep Time 15 minutes mins

Cook Time 10 minutes mins

Total Time 25 minutes mins

Servings: 2 servings

Course: Salad

Cuisine: Polish

Calories: 430

Ingredients Method Notes

Ingredients

  

Salad

• 1 bunch asparagus
• 4-5 fresh figs can be replaced with strawberries
• 2 handfuls baby spinach
• several pine nuts
• 1 teaspoon coconut oil
• 1 avocado for serving
• a pinch of salt

Sauce

• 4 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 tablespoon honey
• 1 teaspoon sweet mustard
• 2 handfuls baby spinach
• juice of half a lemon

Method

 

1. Wash the asparagus and snap off the woody ends by bending each spear.
   
2. Boil the spears for about 8 minutes in slightly salted water, taking them out while still slightly firm.
   
3. Wash the baby spinach for the plate and dry it thoroughly with kitchen towels.
   
4. Melt the coconut oil in a pan and warm the halved figs for under a minute, cut face down.
   
5. Blend the olive oil, honey, mustard, spinach and lemon juice until smooth, then stir in the pine nuts.
   
6. Arrange the spinach, warm asparagus and figs on a plate, spoon the sauce over and serve with sliced avocado.
   

Notes

Ingredient quantities are taken from the recipe box as published. Calories are an estimate from the listed quantities.

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