The Best Shaved Asparagus Salad with Lime Vinaigrette
This is the asparagus recipe you’ve been waiting for. It’s bright, fresh, full of texture, and completely unexpected. You need to bring this Best Shaved Asparagus Salad with Lime Vinaigrette to your next picnic or family gathering!
If you’re looking for some other asparagus recipes, consider this Easy Cold Asparagus Orzo Salad with Lemon-Parmesan Vinaigrette or this Quick Air Fryer Salmon and Asparagus with Lemon Brown Butter.
I get so excited for asparagus season every year. Like genuinely excited.
It’s actually such a versatile vegetable. There are so many ways to prepare it, yet I find that so many people tend to keep cooking it the same ways. Now don’t get me wrong, if you love the way you make your asparagus, that is wonderful and you should keep doing you.
But, even so, I’m making it my personal mission to open your eyes to some new ways to enjoy the asparagus that Spring gifts us every year.
First up: one of my favorite ways, a shaved asparagus salad.
What you’ll love about this recipe:
Recipe ingredients
You’ll need the following ingredients to make this incredible Shaved Asparagus Salad:
Ingredient Notes
The ingredients to make this raw asparagus salad are easy to find and readily available at most any grocery store. If you’re able, I would highly recommend grabbing anything you can at your local farmer’s market for maximum flavor.
Here are a few ingredient notes:
Asparagus: The best type of asparagus to use for this are any of the thicker varieties. Thin, pencil asparagus, is virtually impossible to shave.
Burrata: This cheese is one of life’s guilty pleasures. A thin outer layer of fresh mozzarella that hold a mixture of cream and mozzarella shreds, provides a variety of textures and creaminess that are so pleasing and such a lovely complement to the crunchy raw asparagus. If, for some reason, you are unable to find it, I have outlined some substitutions below.
How to make The Best Shaved Asparagus Salad with Lime Vinaigrette: STEP BY STEP
Be sure to check out the full recipe and ingredient list in the recipe card below
Steps 1 & 2:
To start, remove the bottom woody portion of the asparagus spears. You can do this by bending the spears where they will snap at their natural breaking point. Alternatively, in the interest of time and weeknight cooking, you can bend one, let it snap, and then use it as a guide to trim the rest with a knife.
Next, with a vegetable peeler, shave each asparagus spear from top to bottom.
Steps 3 & 4:
After shaving each spear, cut the remaining tip in half lengthwise.
Roughly chop the pistachios and mint and set aside.
Steps 5 & 6:
Whisk all of the vinaigrette ingredients together until well combined. For more details about this vinaigrette, check out this post!
Drizzle the vinaigrette over the asparagus and add the mint and pistachios. Gently toss everything together until well coated. Transfer to a serving dish and add ball of burrata to the center and drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with chili flakes.
Chef Notes & Tips
- Using the correct asparagus is key for this recipe. You don’t need to remember varieties or anything like that – you just need to focus on the size and use asparagus that medium to thick. The thicker the spear, the better!
- To shave the asparagus, you need to use a nice and sharp vegetable peeler in order to get nice long strands. I, personally, have a handful of different vegetable peelers, but the one I go back to over and over is this one – it’s simple, inexpensive, fits well in my hand, and is always sharp.
- If you’re transporting this salad, you’ll want to wait to dress the salad until close to serving time for the best texture. Just bring all the parts separately, and assemble before eating.
Storage & Reheating
STORAGE: Store this salad in the refrigerator in an airtight container for up to 3 days. Please note that as time goes on, the asparagus will get progressively softer, losing its fresh crunch. It will still be delicious, but the texture will change over time.
FREEZING: I would definitely not recommend freezing this salad. When thawed, it would be a soupy mess and also have a very mushy texture.
Additions & Substitutions
ADDITIONS
Fresh greens: You could consider adding a few fresh greens to the salad if you would like, though I would limit what you add, as you definitely want the asparagus to be the star of the dish!
SUBSTITUTIONS
Burrata: Honestly, there are so many different directions you could go here. First, you could omit the cheese altogether, if you’re looking to avoid dairy. Otherwise, you could consider fresh mozzarella, which would be closest in texture to the burrata, although definitely not the same. Or, you could consider harder cheeses like shaved parmesan, shaved Pecorino Romano, or ricotta salata. These would all be delicious options.
Pistachios: Although I am partial to pistachios, you can easily substitute another nut in this recipe – in particular almonds, walnuts, and hazelnuts would work particularly well.
FAQs
I hope you love THE BEST SHAVED ASPARAGUS SALAD WITH LIME VINAIGRETTE! If you make it, be sure to leave a rating so I know how you liked it!
The Best Shaved Asparagus Salad with Lime Vinaigrette
Ingredients
- 1 bunch asparagus (spears should be thick)
- 2 limes (zest and juice)
- 1/4 cup olive oil (plus more for drizzling)
- 1 shallot (finely chopped)
- 1 tsp honey
- 1/2 tsp kosher salt
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 1/3 cup mint (roughly chopped)
- 1/4 cup pistachios (roughly chopped)
- 1 Burrata
- 1 pinch chili flakes
Instructions
- First remove the bottom woody portion of the asparagus spears. You can do this by bending the spears where they will snap at their natural breaking point. Alternatively, in the interest of time and weeknight cooking, you can bend one, let it snap, and then use it as a guide to trim the rest with a knife.
- Next, using a vegetable peeler, shave each spear from top to bottom, leaving the tip intact. Then, cut off the tip and cut it in half, lengthwise. Add all of the shaved asparagus and asparagus tips to a large bowl and set aside.
- Roughly chop the mint and pistachios and set them aside. Finely chop the shallot and set aside.
- To make the vinaigrette, whisk together the lime juice and zest, olive oil, shallot, honey, salt and pepper. *See note below.
- Add the vinaigrette to the asparagus and gently toss to combine. Add the mint and pistachios and toss again.
- Transfer the salad to a serving dish and add the burrata on top, cutting it open on top into quarters. Drizzle it with olive oil and sprinkle with chili flakes.
Notes
- Be sure to use asparagus with thick spears.
- Be sure to use a sharp vegetable peeler.
- Dress the salad right before you are going to serve it.
- For more detail about the details behind this recipe (ratios, etc.), please see this detailed post.
Nutrition
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