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Asparagus Salad, with Truffles, Royal

A chilled asparagus salad seasoned with salt, pepper, lemon, and topped with truffles, eggs, and tartare sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Asparagus Salad, with Truffles, Royal

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare the asparagus as directed in a previous recipe.

  2. Add half the quantity of truffles, cut into short Julienne.

  3. Season with coarse sea salt, black pepper, and lemon juice. Mix gently, cover, and refrigerate for one hour.

Assemble and serve

  1. When ready to serve, garnish the salad with alternating chopped egg yolks and whites around the border.

  2. Add slices of truffles dipped in reduced cold Madeira wine sauce.

  3. Create a crown in the center and fill it with Tartare sauce.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Asparagus + lemontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together704 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Asparagus + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,968 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Asparagus + truffletop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together141 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  5. Truffle + madeira winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together195 recipes

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Asparagus
Forms the main body of the salad, giving a crisp, tender vegetable base.
Truffles
Add a strong, earthy aroma that defines the flavour of the dish.
Hard-boiled eggs
Provide a soft, creamy texture and a mild richness as the garnish.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavours and balances the richness.

The step that matters

Refrigerate for one hour after mixing. Resting the seasoned asparagus and truffles lets the salt and lemon juice draw out and blend flavours, while keeping the vegetables cold so they stay crisp rather than wilting.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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