Asparagus and pea frittata

I love asparagus and it's everywhere right now. It's such a big deal when the British asparagus season starts that people go a bit cuckoo for it - there was an entire stall devoted to the green stuff at Borough market yesterday, great mountains of it in tip-top condition, still squeaky with freshness.

On a side note, did you know there's a British asparagus season blog? Clearly this is a vegetable that attracts the more obsessive segments of society.

This frittata tastes really fresh and is super quick to make. It's a real no nonsense recipe that fed me for lunch today and will go into my lunchboxes until Tuesday. I'm very fussy at lunchtime, and I've been known to blithely ignore a carefully packed lunchbox if it didn't look tasty enough by 1pm. But I won't be having that problem this week.

ASPARAGUS AND PEA FRITTATA

a large bundle of thin stemmed asparagus
75g fresh or frozen peas
7 eggs, whisked with a little salt and lots of black pepper
4 spring onions, sliced
20g grated parmesan
1 small knob of butter
olive oil

1) Wash and dry the asparagus, then snap the ends off each one - there should be a natural breaking point which helpfully tells you where the woody part of the stem begins.

2) Wipe the base of a large frying pan with olive oil, then fry the asparagus for a minute before adding a few tablespoons of water, to steam the asparagus. Don't let this run dry while the asparagus are cooking. When the asparagus are just tender (try piercing the stems with a knife), remove them from the pan and arrange in the base of a lightly oiled 20cm silicon round cake tin.

3) Add another teaspoon of oil to the pan then gently fry the spring onions and peas for 3-5 minutes, until the onions have softened, then turn off the heat and add the eggs and parmesan, stirring through quickly. You just want to warm up the eggs, not cook them here.

4) Pour the mixture into the oiled tin, and bake at 400f/200c/gas mark 6 for 12 minutes, until puffed up and golden on top.