Chefs share their favorite spring recipes

Story and photos by Tim Brouk

With spring, green will start to sprout in your yard, garden and, according to Greater Lafayette chefs, on your dinner plate. Green signifies renewal and deliciousness as ingredients such as asparagus, broccoli, basil and spinach come into season and into some savory recipes for you to try by Greater Lafayette chefs.

Cody Hall

Cody Hall | Digby’s | 133 N. Fourth St.

Along with his chef’s hat, Cody Hall wears the figurative general manager’s cap at Digby’s, a popular downtown Lafayette pub and grill. For the past six months, Hall has revamped the menu, adding diverse options to go along with Digby’s staples of burgers and those gonzo fried cheese bricks.

Hall’s light pasta dish is packed with flavor as well as fresh asparagus and shiitake and/or morel mushrooms. These primary ingredients are easily grown in Indiana.

“When I think about cooking, the first thing I consider is always seasonality and locality,” says Hall, adding that the following dish is being considered for Digby’s menu. “The best ingredients come from somewhere close. To me, early spring in Indiana is asparagus and morel mushrooms.”

Mushroom and Asparagus Linguine

(Makes 4 servings)

• 2 cups sliced mushrooms

• 1 lb. dried linguini

• 1 lb. fresh asparagus

• 1 cup heavy cream

• 1 cup parmesan cheese

• 1/2 cup sliced leeks

• 1/2 cup white wine

• 1/4 cup cooking oil

• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh garlic

• 2 tablespoons chopped basil

• 1 tablespoon chopped parsley

• 1 tablespoon lemon juice

• 1 tablespoon butter

• 2 teaspoons salt

• 2 teaspoons black pepper

Wash and dry produce; if using morel mushrooms, soak in salted water for 20 minutes. Slice mushrooms and leeks; set aside.

Chop garlic, basil, parsley and asparagus; set aside. Measure out heavy cream, parmesan, wine, oil, lemon juice and butter.

In a large stock pot bring four liters of heavily salted water to boil. Cook linguine to package instructions. When draining pasta, reserve 1/2 cup of cooking water.

While waiting for water to boil, add cooking oil to large sauté pan and turn on medium-high heat. When oil is hot, add leeks and sauté until they start to brown, stirring occasionally.

Add mushrooms; season with salt and pepper. When the mushrooms have cooked through, add asparagus and sauté asparagus until cooked through about 75% and then add garlic. Cook garlic until it starts to brown and stick to the pan. Stir in wine and lemon juice and bring to a boil. Simmer about three minutes and add heavy cream.

When the heavy cream comes to boil, stir in parmesan and butter.

When the sauce thickens and becomes smooth, add reserved pasta water and cooked pasta. Toss to mix well and serve.

Garnish with fresh herbs and parmesan.

Kat Holaday | Snuggs Pizza and The Spot Tavern | 409 S. Fourth St.

After a winter of Detroit-style(ish) “grandma slices,” Snuggs Pizza fully blooms in the spring when its patio wood-fired oven is ignited. Full pizzas are paddled in and out starting this month through October.

A newer but significant player in the local pizza scene, Snuggs’ recipes feature ingredients grown at The Spot. The Lafayette watering hole grows its own greens — chard, spinach, arugula, broccoli and basil — and tomatoes. Most of these ingredients are featured on the summer favorite Greens Pizza on the Snuggs wood-fired pizza menu.

Holaday credits the doughmeisters at Smittybread in the formulation of the pizza crust, which is a sourdough base.

“It’s naturally leavened,” Holaday says. “We put a lot of our love and energy into our doughs.”

The pizzas are baked at 900 degrees, and the menu is always changing depending on peak ingredient timing and availability.

Same-Day Dough for Cast Iron Skillet Pizza

(Makes three dough balls, each about 9.5 ounces.)

Start this recipe in the morning for pizza in the evening. This process takes approximately 10 hours from mixing to eating.

Helpful tools: thermometer, kitchen scale, stand mixer, bench scraper, wooden pizza peel

• 2 teaspoons fine sea salt

• 1/32 teaspoon active dry yeast (just a pinch)

• 1 1/2 cups water at 55 degrees

• 3 2/3 cups King Arthur bread flour

To mix and knead:

Dissolve the salt in the water in a large mixing bowl.

Add the yeast and stir until dissolved. Gradually mix in the flour until a shaggy dough is formed.

With your hands, knead and fold the dough onto itself for 10-15 minutes. It will be very sticky at first but will feel less wet as the flour continues to absorb the water. Do not add more flour. Trust the process and scrape as much dough from your hands as possible as you go.

(If you have a stand mixer, you can skip the kneading by hand and mix the dough on low speed for 15 minutes.)

After kneading and folding, the dough should feel plump and springy when poked.

To ferment:

Cover your bowl with a kitchen towel or plastic wrap, and let the dough ferment at room temperature (ideally 70 degrees) for six hours.

Ball up dough and second ferment:

At this point, the dough will be plump and springy.

Lightly flour your hands and bench scraper. There’s no need to flour your dough or work surface: That will only make the dough stiff.

Dump your dough onto a dry work surface using your hand to scrape it from the bowl.

Cut and divide the dough into 3 equal pieces.

Shape the dough into a ball using your hands or bench scraper by pulling the dough towards you with resistance on the work surface; then rotate a quarter turn and repeat the pulling process until the dough forms a tight ball and is smooth on the top.

Once the shaping is complete, transfer your dough balls to a flour-dusted sheet pan, spacing your dough balls out so they have room to spread without touching.

Lightly spray plastic wrap with non-stick spray and cover the dough. Let the dough balls rest at room temperature for three hours.

Shaping and baking:

Begin this process when you have one hour left of the second fermentation.

Set an oven rack six inches below the broiler.

Preheat the oven to its highest temperature (usually 500550 degrees) for 45 minutes.

When the oven is preheated and you are ready to bake, set the oven to broil.

Heat a large cast-iron skillet (12-14 inches) on the stovetop over medium-heat for 3-5 minutes.

Lightly flour a work surface and pizza peel, and gently remove a dough ball from the tray onto the floured surface.

Starting in the center of the dough, lightly push down and outward to form a round shape, leaving a half-inch outer edge to form the crust.

Once the dough is roughly a seven-inch disk, gently pick it up and drape it over your fists. Move your fists around the circle allowing gravity to stretch the dough as you turn it.

Once the dough is around 11-12 inches, place it on the lightly floured peel and gently tug the edges to reshape it into a circle.

Give the peel a quick shake to be sure the dough isn’t sticking. If it is, gently lift the sides and dust flour under the dough until it moves freely on top of the peel when you shake it.

Your oven should be set to broil, and your cast iron should be smoking hot on the stovetop.

Slide the shaped dough from the peel into the cast iron. Using an oven mitt, quickly shake the cast iron to center the dough.

Turn the heat to low and top your pizza.

Put the cast iron in the oven under the broiler and cook until the crust is puffy and beginning to char in 2-4 minutes.

Rotate the pan during baking for even cooking.

Ake Waratap | Thai Essence | 1534 Win Hentschel Blvd.

A spring menu staple for Thai Essence is a bouquet of healthy, fresh flavors and textures, also known as the Mango Salad. The dish features a semi-ripe mango sliced into strips.

“The semi-ripe mango has a bit of a crunch,” Waratap explains. “A really ripe mango is going to be too soft.”

The salad’s protein comes in the form of chicken and shrimp, with tofu as a meatless option.

Much flavor comes in the form of the salad’s spicy dressing. Waratap doesn’t drizzle it on top, though. The shrimp and chicken are cooked with the dressing. The spicy flavors are absorbed into the protein.

The heat is balanced with iceberg lettuce, green onions and cilantro — as well as the sweet, sweet mango.

Mango Salad

Waratap rarely measures his ingredients. His eyes and taste buds are his guides, but he assures the mango salad is customizable. It’s up to the home chef how spicy or how much protein to put in.

• 1 semi-ripe mango, cut into strips

• Iceberg lettuce

• Chopped cilantro, red onions and green onions

• Shrimp and sliced chicken

• Toasted coconut flakes

Dressing includes fish sauce, brown sugar, fresh lime juice and red chili flakes.

In a pan, boil a shallow amount of water. Once boiling, add shrimp and chicken.

While the protein cooks, mix dressing ingredients then pour into the pan.

While it’s cooking, assemble the salad, starting with lettuce then the chopped herbs, onions and sliced mango.

Top with cooked chicken and shrimp and dust with toasted coconut flakes.

Lauren Reed | Lafayette

Reed has cooked for former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at a gala event, as well as hungry, rabid football fans and former NFL players at several Super Bowls. The Lafayette chef gained a local following from her farm-to-table dinners at Prophetstown State Park.

Today, she is head chef for a Purdue University sorority. While college students are a different audience than those at football games and state parks, Reed’s kitchen prowess and creativity have won over her house of young Boilermakers.

To celebrate spring, Reed reached back to her Prophetstown days to reintroduce her Spring Asparagus and Orzo Salad.

“Asparagus is the best vegetable, in my opinion,” Reed says. “The dish has roasted asparagus with a lemon-garlic dressing. There’s some feta cheese in there, sun-dried tomatoes, and it’s topped with microgreens. It’s very light, refreshing. It’s just a way to welcome spring.” ★

Spring Asparagus and Orzo Salad

(Serves 6-8)

• 2 cups dry orzo

• 1 bottle Garlic Expressions dressing

• 1 bunch fresh asparagus

• 1 English cucumber, diced

• ¼ cup sun-dried tomato, chopped

• ½ cup feta or goat cheese, crumbled

• 1 bunch fresh parsley, chopped

• Juice of ½ a lemon

• Salt and pepper to taste

• Microgreens to garnish

Cook orzo to package directions until al dente. Drain and cool.

Grill or lightly roast asparagus spears for three minutes. Cool and chop.

Mix orzo, asparagus, cucumber, cheese, tomato and parsley. Stir in dressing and lemon juice.

Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Let salad rest in refrigerator at least an hour before serving. Top with microgreens.