Day 274: Mt. Asparagus

We had planned to enjoy a cheese plate at the end of our meal at Absinthe tonight, but after the asparagus "shared plate" we ordered turned out to be a mountain of food, that seemed unlikely.  As you can see in the background of this photo, we also had the cured meat plate, making that cheese thing REALLY unlikely.

Asparagus is in season now and this was a wonderful way to serve them.  They were topped with burrata, roasted peppers, and arugula, with a charred onion vinaigrette.  A slice of speck was draped over the top, but we moved that over to the meat plate as there were a lot of flavors already working on the asparagus dish.

Still hoping for cheese, I chose one of the lighter entrees on the menu:  scallops with artichokes and baby fennel over pureed sunchoke.  I love scallops but unfortunately, I haven't mastered cooking them so I order them at restaurants all the time.  These were very tasty and made me want to try preparing them at home again sometime soon.

In the end, we decided to have one piece of cheese, just to help us finish our wine.  The Absinthe cheese menu is just too good to pass up.  Each cheese is served with a specially paired accompaniment and it's so much fun to taste them all.  We went with a blue cheese tonight, paired with candied kumquats.  Coincidentally, I purchased some kumquats at the farmer's market today and I have NO idea what to do with them!  If you have an idea or a recipe, please leave a comment!