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Asparagus with lemon and tarragon hollandaise

We’re all becoming more health conscious, and making hollandaise with olive oil instead of butter results in an equally rich sauce. You can flavour the hollandaise with any citrus fruit – grapefruit or orange, for example – but with asparagus I always like to keep it simple, with lemon and a sprinkling of tarragon.

Print recipe
Serves 4

Serves 4

Vegetarian

Vegetarian

Dairy-free

Dairy-free

Gluten-free

Gluten-free

Ingredients

  • 450g asparagus, trimmed

For the hollandaise sauce:

  • 3 large egg yolks 
  • Squeeze of lemon juice, plus extra to taste 
  • 200ml olive oil 
  • 2 tbsp chopped tarragon 
  • Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Cooking instructions

  • First make the hollandaise sauce. Using a large balloon whisk, beat the egg yolks with a squeeze of lemon juice and seasoning in a bowl set over a pan of simmering water. Beat vigorously for about 10 minutes until the mixture thickens. (To make sure the sauce doesn’t overheat, take it on and off the heat while you whisk, scraping around the sides of the bowl with a plastic spatula.) The aim is to achieve a golden, airy sauce that forms ribbons on the surface when the whisk is lifted. 
  • Warm the olive oil in a small pan, then set aside. Off the heat, gradually add a little of the warmed olive oil at a time to the egg mix, then return the bowl over a gentle heat to cook a little more. Remove from the heat again and whisk in another dash of warm oil. Repeat until all the oil is incorporated and the sauce has a thick, mayonnaise-like consistency. 
  • Whisk in lemon juice, salt and pepper to taste, plus 2–3 tablespoons of warm water to give the mixture a pouring consistency, then add the chopped tarragon. 
  • Blanch the asparagus by plunging it into boiling salted water for 2–3 minutes until its rawness has been removed but it is still crunchy. Drain well and serve with the hollandaise.

Read more in Gordon's recipe books...

Recipes extracted from Gordon Ramsay's Ultimate Cookery Course, published by Hodder & Stoughton, £30

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