Asparagus and potato frittata

Taken from "Vegetable Heaven" by Catherine Mason
(Pauntley Prints, 2002, ISBN: 0-9534879-3-6, price £20.00)
[other sample recipes]

This is a bright but delicate spring frittata, bursting with vitality. The asparagus season is short but sweet, rather like spring itself. It seems to start quite slowly, but before you know it the spears are springing up thick and fast, burgeoning before your eyes. From a gardener's point of view asparagus requires patience and forward planning – you can't start to harvest it until three years after planting. The prospect of this long, frustrating wait led me to plant not one but three asparagus beds, so now, for about six weeks a year, we're swimming in the stuff!

250 g new potatoes, scrubbed and cut into even chunks if large, otherwise left whole
250 g fresh asparagus
6 eggs
1 tablespoon olive oil
15 g butter
150 g Greek feta cheese, coarsely crumbled
about 10 g (2 tablespoons) chopped fresh mint

Simmer the new potatoes in salted water until tender, then drain and cut them into 1 cm dice. While the potatoes are cooking prepare the asparagus by trimming off and discarding the tough bottom part of the spears. You can easily tell where the spears start to toughen – just flex each spear very gently in your hands. Towards the tip they will feel quite bendy. The further down the spear you go, the stiffer they get, and towards the bottom they feel very rigid. Chop them off where stiff meets bendy, and peel if the skin seems at all tough.
Cut the prepared asparagus into 2 cm sections, keeping the tips separate. Steam the lower sections for about 7 minutes or until tender, adding the tips to the steamer after 2 minutes (they take less time to cook). These times are very approximate since asparagus is infinitely variable, so start testing early.
Beat the eggs with a fork just enough to amalgamate them, then season with salt and pepper. Heat the olive oil and butter in a large, heavy frying pan (28–30 cm diameter), until the butter foams and the pan is quite hot. Pour in the eggs (the pan should be hot enough to make them sizzle) and immediately turn down the heat to quite low. The idea is to set just the bottom of the frittata so, unless you're using a gas hob, you may need to take the pan off the heat for a few moments so the rest of it doesn't cook too quickly.
Swiftly scatter the cooked asparagus and potatoes into the frittata and cook gently for 10–15 minutes or until the base is set but the top still looks quite moist. About half way through this period pre-heat the grill.
Scatter the crumbled cheese evenly over the surface of the frittata and slide the pan under the hot grill for a couple of minutes to set the top. Sprinkle with the chopped mint just before serving. Serve hot or, better still, lukewarm with some decent bread and a big, leafy salad.

SERVES 2–3