Personally, I love this dish at Eastertime. It’s perfect for the season with all of the fresh garden ingredients.
Some Notes:
Pastured Eggs come from chickens that are allowed to roam free. More than just being ‘organic’ they really taste better and contain more nutrients, the yolks are deep gold and orange.
To trim the asparagus, remove the tough fibrous bottom. You can use a knife to cut through the entire bunch at once, but I prefer to do it spear by spear so you can feel where it starts to get tender and snap it at the appropriate point. Also for this recipe you will want to conserve the tips and add them in later as the recipe shows. This is because they take less time to cook than the stems.
Fresh Basket Cheese is available in the Spring at your Italian Market, it’s milky sweet, unsalted and it’s texture is a cross between fresh ricotta and fresh mozzarella. It holds together like mozzarella, but it’s not as meltable. It’s slightly crumbly like ricotta but not nearly as mushy. It can be used in recipes or eaten just as-is. It’s a staple on our Easter table.
The Dry Cured Sausage in this recipe is the one that was made from January’s pig slaughter. It hung in my parent’s basement cantina from the month of January until it was cured enough to be taken down and preserved in oil or vacuum packed. If you don’t have dried sausage hanging in your basement, you can substitute your favorite salami or sopressata or even sub in fresh Italian sausage. Just remove the casing and make sure to cook it thoroughly in the pan.
Ingredients:
- 2 Tablespoons – Olive Oil
- ¼ lb. – Pancetta, diced
- 12 – Eggs, beaten, preferably pastured*
- 1 Bunch – Asparagus, washed and trimmed, separate tips and cut into 1” pieces**
- ½ – Fresh Basket Cheese, cut into cubes***
- ½ lb.- Dry-Cured Sausage, cut into bite sized pieces****
- 1 teaspoon – Kosher Salt
Preparation Steps:
- Crack eggs into a bowl and whisk with 1 teaspoon of salt. Set aside.
- Dice pancetta.
- Cut dry-cured sausage into bite sized pieces.
- In a large cast iron or non-stick skillet, heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil and sauté pancetta until nicely browned.
- Add dry-cured sausage and sauté until just lightly browned. You don’t want to overcook the sausage since it’s already dry-cured.
- Add in all the asparagus except for the tips. The tips take less time to cook and you don’t want them to lose their color and crispness.
- Add about a tablespoon of water to the pan. This will allow the asparagus to steam a bit. Once initial asparagus is tender but still al dente, add the remaining asparagus tips to pan.
- Add another 2 tablespoons of water.
- Taste for salt, add as needed.
- Add the cubed basket cheese to the pan, cook for a minute and allow to melt a bit.
- Add the whisked eggs to the pan. Allow the egg to cook for a minute before using a wooden spoon to slowly scrape the bottom of pan. Keep gently folding the egg mixture until it’s cooked through.
- Serve with Cudruru Italian Easter Bread.
