Asparagus cordon bleu

You love asparagus but are looking for new ways to prepare them? Then you definitively have to try these breaded asparagus cordon bleu. You can have them as a starter, or as a lunch. Asparagus cordon bleu are crispy and crunchy on the outside, but at the same time juicy and tender on the inside. A heavenly interpretation of cordon bleu with asparagus.

How to make Asparagus cordon bleu?

You can serve asparagus cordon bleu as a starter, but just as well as a main course. Here we made it as an starter. But you might as well scale it up to a main dish.

Start by peeling the asparagus. After that, remove the lower ends. They are harder and will not be as tender as the rest of this divine vegetable.

Meanwhile, you can bring water to a boil to cook the asparagus. We are going to cook them for about 8 minutes until they are al dente. They should not be well done, because they will go into the pan for frying for a short time afterwards. When the asparagus are al dente, we take them out of the water and let it drain briefly.

While the asparagus is cooking, we can prepare the flour and breadcrumbs in two separate plates. And we beat the egg in a deep plate.

We also prepare the cheese and the cooked ham. We place the young cheese on the cooked ham. Also have some toothpicks ready to pin the roll. Then we take two or three asparagus and roll them in the cheese and ham. We then fix the roll with two toothpicks.

In the next step we will bread the rolls. We roll them first in the flour, then in the beaten egg and finally in the breadcrumbs. If the toothpicks bother you inconveniently, you can also cut a piece off. Or, as I usually do, push them through the roll, so that you can bread all sides well.

Now it's time to let the butter bubble in the pan. It should be very hot because we want to bake the breaded rolls crispy. Turn the cordon bleu rolls after one or two minutes so that the asparagus rolls are golden brown on all sides.

When the asparagus cordon bleu are ready, you can immediately put them on the plates to serve. Take out the toothpicks. Then finish with a little lettuce and some cherry tomatoes. And enjoy! They will be golden brown and crispy on the outside. But juicy and tender inside. Heavenly delicious!

What is "cordon bleu"?

You may know cordon bleu as the meat (usually pork, veal or chicken) filled with ham and cheese on the inside and breaded on the outside. that is eaten fried in the pan or in the oven. So you can see already a lot of similarities with our asparagus cordon bleu.

But, of course, it is not possible to stuff asparagus. That's why the asparagus are in the middle of the roll here. Surrounded by the cheese, ham and finally the crispy breading.

As with many dishes, it is not so easy to trace cordon bleu back to the exact origins. Cordon bleu is often also referred to as a "Schnitzel". Which places it immediately in the German speaking countries Austria, Switzerland and Germany. But on the other hand "cordon bleu" is French for blue ribbon.

One story has it that a Swiss cook had to find a creative solution for a double booking and a lack of portions to serve everyone. So she halved the portions of meat and filled them up with ham and cheese. And breaded them. This was so successful that the owner offered her "le cordon bleu", a blue ribbon that is used in France to recognise excellent cooks. But she suggested instead this would be the perfect name for the new recipe. With cordon referring to the breaded outside and bleu to the juicy molten cheese and ham in the middle. Bleu is the French term for blue rare.

The method of preparing cordon bleu is quite new. The first appearance in a cookbook was in 1949. It became really popular in the Americas in 1967, after being published in the New York Times. And did you know that April 4 is meanwhile national cordon bleu day?

More about cordon bleu:

• Cordon bleu (Wikipedia).
• Chicken cordon bleu, a dish invented out of necessity (The courier).
• What is cordon bleu? Meaning, history and culinary significance (Hotelier Lifestyle).

More surprising.asparagus

We love asparagus so much! So you may find some more surprising recipe ideas in the following articles:

• Passionate asparagus (with passion fruit).
• Asparagus tonnato (with tuna fish sauce).
• Flemish asparagus (the classic Flemish style asparagus with egg, butter and parsley).
• Asparagus strawberry salad.
• Salmon with lemon butter sauce and green asparagus.

If you speak Dutch, you can find the Dutch version of this recipe on gerechtenweb.blog.