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Asparagus Flemish style with Filliers Jonge Ambachtelijke Graanjenever

On the plate are peeled white asparagus with coarsely mashed hard-boiled egg, melted butter and finely chopped parsley, with baby potatoes and slices of ham alongside. Opposite stands a young Belgian grain genever whose malt wine has not spent time in a cask, so that it can cut through the butter without overpowering the asparagus.

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From the shelf

The bottle

Filliers Jonge Ambachtelijke Graanjenever comes from the Filliers grain distillery in Deinze in East Flanders. It is a young jenever of 35% ABV in a 100 cl bottle, a refined blend of soft and sweet to which distillate of juniper berries and herbs has been added; the malt wine for this bottle is not kept in a cask. The description gives no exact malt wine share. For young jenever, at least 35% ABV and at least 1.5% alcohol from malt wine apply, with in practice at most 15% malt wine.

Filliers Jonge Ambachtelijke Graanjenever

The combination

Why this works together

Asparagus the Flemish way is in fact butter with asparagus in it: 125 grams of butter and six eggs lay down a thick, rich layer against which the asparagus itself stands only very light and slightly bitter. Put an old genever or korenwijn next to it and you lay grain sweetness and cask flavour over that butter, and the asparagus disappears completely. This young grain genever is built precisely to bring little weight: its malt wine is not cask-aged, so there is no vanilla or wood that clumps with the butter. What remains is cold alcohol that dissolves the butter fat and juniper and herbs that go along with the parsley. The light bitterness in the genever finds its counterpart in the bitterness of the asparagus itself. As a result the plate stays rich but not heavy, and the asparagus comes through again with every bite.

At the table

The dish

  • For 4 people
  • Ready in 30 minutes
  • Type starter

What you need

  • 1 kg fresh white asparagus
  • 1 kg baby potatoes
  • 6 medium free-range eggs
  • 10 g fresh parsley
  • 125 g unsalted butter
  • 8 slices of ham
  • a vegetable peeler

How to make it

  1. Peel the asparagus with the thin peeler from just below the tip downwards and cut off the woody end. Halve the largest baby potatoes.
  2. Cook the asparagus in an asparagus pan in lightly salted water for 10 minutes until al dente.
  3. Meanwhile boil the baby potatoes until done, 8 to 10 minutes, and boil the eggs hard for 8 minutes.
  4. Peel the eggs and mash them coarsely. Chop the parsley finely. Melt the butter gently over low heat in a small saucepan.
  5. Drain the asparagus and the baby potatoes and divide them over four warm plates.
  6. Spoon the mashed egg over the asparagus, pour the melted butter over it and sprinkle the parsley over. Lay the ham alongside.

In the glass

Serving

Pour the Filliers chilled from the fridge into a small tulip glass, filled to the rim. At about 8 °C it is cold enough to cut through the melted butter, while the herbs and the juniper can still be followed; straight from the freezer that spiciness disappears. Take the bottle out of the cold about a quarter of an hour before serving if your fridge is at 4 °C.

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