Spring Vegetable Soup

The first local asparagus usually appears at the end of March/beginning of April. Little stalls spring up selling locally grown green asparagus; picked by hand and farmed in sandy soil by the people that are the back bone of rural France.

Wild asparagus - sprue we would call it - appears a little earlier. They are strongly flavoured so blanch the tips in boiling water, chop them coarsely and use them to flavour an omelette. Add about a tbsp of the tips for a two egg omelette. Add them to the hot butter, cook them together for a minute so the that butter absorbs the asparagus flavour, and then proceed as normal. This makes a sophisticates starter for a simple meal, grilled fish with a salad and some fruit to follow.

This recipe is such a pleasure to make and eat in the first days of spring; the spring vegetables are very welcome like a medieval blood cleanser after the winter. It is thickened with rice, which gives it a light spring texture. Chervil is a delicious herb, not seen much in the UK; try to get hold of some if you can for this recipe. Cos lettuce (often called its Americanised Romaine) in soup I hear you say? Cooked, it has sweet mildly earthy flavours that marry well with the other ingredients.
Ingredients
1 bunch of spring onions or 1 leek
1 bunch fresh green asparagus
1 cos lettuce
175g fresh or frozen peas.
25g butter
1 tsp sugar
3-4 tbsp crème fraiche
A few chervil sprigs, if you can get hold of them
2 tbsp long grain rice
1 litre light stock
Method

Prepare the asparagus: the stem ends of asparagus are usually rather tough, so I cut off the bottom 8 cm or so off the 25 cm stem of the asparagus and save them for the vegetable stock. Peel off the outer skin of the stalk end of the remaining half of the stalks and add these peelings to the stock too. The tender tips, half peeled are what you need for this soup.
Wash the cos lettuce, remove any damaged outer leaves and slice the whole lettuce cross wise into 1cm or so slices.
Chop the white part of the spring onions or leek. Melt the butter in a pan, cook the onion or leek for 5 minutes until tender, and add all the rest of the vegetable and cook for a further 2-3 minutes in the butter.
Add the stock, sugar – the sugar emphasises the spring taste of vegetables, and rice and cook for 25 minutes. Purée in blender, just before serving swirl in the cream, chop the chervil finely and it to the soup, and adjust seasoning.