Roasted Asparagus with Gingered Rhubarb Sauce

One reason to cook through a book is to try out recipes that I wouldn't otherwise have tackled because of the technique or the ingredients or both. This recipe is an example of that: it involves asparagus, which I love, and rhubarb, which I don't. Note how the rhubarb is hulking in a dark corner in this picture, big and brooding, waiting to attack the poor delicate asparagus.

I don't love rhubarb because of its tart and bitter qualities. I always eat it when it's offered to me, but it's not my favorite. And then last spring I made a rhubarb crumble that made me reconsider my distaste for the vegetable. So I thought I'd give this recipe a shot.

It's a pretty simple process: you roast asparagus in the oven (I threw in a spring onion as well because I had one) while you brown butter and then sauté ginger, garlic, and rhubarb until the rhubarb breaks down. Then you add a few good squeezes of honey to balance out the tart rhubarb.

As Melissa Clark points out, rhubarb sauce is not pretty, but I don't think it's that hideous, either. We had this dish with macaroni and cheese, and I thought the big flavors of the sharp and spicy rhubarb asparagus balanced out the creamy pasta nicely. Claire wouldn't touch it because "rhubarb is overrated" (and she doesn't like asparagus either). Sami turned up his nose at the idea of rhubarb in a savory dish (and possibly rhubarb in general), but he tried it and decided he liked it: "It's like chutney." Yes, it is.

There were four of us at dinner and this small portion didn't get finished, so I can't really say the recipe was a raging success. But I thought it was a worthy experiment, and I enjoyed the leftovers (the sauce is excellent on roasted potatoes as well).