A Light But Luscious Asparagus Bow-Tie Salad

Brought to you by the boys in the lab.

WE HAD A BIT OF A FRAZZLE THIS WEEK, here in the salad lab, over a couple of asparagus salads we were playing around with. I knew I wanted something fresh and super-green in both appearance and taste, so I was happy with that curly, pretty shaved asparagus salad you recently received.

But the boys in the lab also wanted an asparagus pasta salad; they’re in the third incarnation of their normcore phase, so they were imagining a 1980s bow tie (or farfalle) contraption. And: They wanted goat cheese, of course.

We got into an argument about that, involving a bit of hurt feelings and some childish stomping, especially after I referred to goat cheese as the salad-maker’s cheat. “It’s unfairly irresistible!” I yelled, even though I absolutely adore it. “It’s the cocaine of cheeses!”

That did it. They stormed out. I turned on some loud Sigur Rós (a band I once used as an extremely effective balm for grief, despite the fact that I don’t understand a word of Icelandic—or Hopelandic); then I took a nap. When I woke up, I had several texts with sad-face emojis and an apology from those knuckleheads. So as my apology back to them, I made their desired salad, which turned out beautifully. The goat cheese serves as a liberator of the springy flavors rather than as a heavy blanket.

The great secret about salad is this: As long as you’re using ingredients you love, the worst you can do is make a clumsy salad, or a lackluster one. And even then, adjustments can always be made. But to make a terrible salad from ingredients you love? You really have to put some elbow grease into that.

Make your roasted peppers, add garlic, eat them on sandwiches.

But just to be sure, I created two versions of this salad, with cheese-related adjustments. I tried it with tiny cubes of pecorino; it was quite nice but perhaps less invigorating. If you decide to make this substitution, use about ¾ of a cup of tinily diced pecorino in place of the goat cheese, and toss it with the salad rather than using it as a topping.