Watercress Salad with Roasted Asparagus, and Peas

A quick, healthy, and delicious salad with green asparagus, pea, and eggs, tossed in a refreshing yogurt-based honey-mustard dressing.

This whole lockdown situation has definitely spurred my activities in the kitchen for the past couple of weeks. I had a go at things for which I didn’t have much time before. No attempts at sourdough bread (as everybody seemed to have been hoarding yeast, rye and bread flour in all our the supermarkets…), but in the last week alone I had a go at 72-hour pizza dough, making dill-pickles, raspberry sorbet, apple sauce, smores cake, and a rhubarb Tarte Tatin. Apparently, I got a bit bored. 😁

With shopping trips down to the bare minimum, we sought out loads of new and diverse recipes to try. And with great results, as you will see in the upcoming posts.

And with the temperatures rising quickly to almost summer levels, I dare calling this one an essential spring and summer salad! The July 2018 recipe by Sophie Godwin was rehashed in the April 2020 edition of BBC Good Food Magazine. A good thing as I had completely missed the original. The watercress is a nice alternative from the regular leaf lettuces, and it is damn tasty too.

As such, I stayed close to the original but did make some changes. As I had bought 2 packs of 75g / 2¾oz, I used all the watercress (which is 50% more than the original, but it proved enough to serve it as a salad meal for two). As a result, I also made a bit more dressing with relatively more mustard and honey, but the original amount of lemon zest and juice.

From a methodology perspective, there were some tweaks as well. I used fresh peas instead of frozen so I boiled them separately rather than adding the frozen peas to the boiling eggs for the final minute. Furthermore, I didn’t oven-roast the green asparagus and the croutons. As I bought (smaller) green asparagus tips, I thought the griddle pan to be a safer option and easier to keep turning them. Of course, I also used that pan for toasting the bread.

The recipe (serves 2 as a meal salad, 4 as a side)

4 tbsp natural yogurt
1 tbsp wholegrain mustard
2 tsp honey
½ lemon, zested and juiced
150g / 5¼oz watercress
1 large slice sourdough bread
200g / 7oz green asparagus tips, tough ends removed
1½ tbsp cold-pressed rapeseed oil or extra virgin olive oil
200g / 7oz fresh peas
2 eggs

Mix the yogurt, mustard, and honey together. Add the lemon zest, lemon juice, and some seasoning to taste.
Squeeze any remaining lemon juice over the watercress.
Preheat a griddle pan on medium-high heat. Drizzle the slice of bread on both sides with about half of the oil, and toast until golden. When ready, roughly cut or tear in croutons.
Separately, cook the fresh peas in a saucepan of boiling water for 10 minutes, drain, and transfer to very cold water until cool.
In the meantime, cook the eggs in a saucepan of boiling water for about 6 to 7 minutes. Drain under cold water until cool. Peel the eggs, then cut into quarters.
Toss the asparagus tips in the remaining oil, season with salt and freshly ground pepper, and roast them for 5 to 6 minutes until just tender.
To assemble, mix the asparagus and peas through the creamy dressing and then toss through the watercress. Nestle in the eggs and croutons, season, and serve.