Make the most of the all-too-brief English asparagus season by devouring the succulent green stems by the plateful – plus some cool trivia about ‘sparrow grass’
It’s a foodie cliché to declare your love for asparagus, particularly here in Britain where asparagus lovers are so passionate they even have a two-month festival devoted to it. English asparagus is widely considered to be the best in the world – though I rather suspect the secret is freshness and it’s good anywhere as long as it doesn’t have long to travel from plate to fork.
But cliché or not, love it I do. And whether it’s the Englishness of the asparagus or its freshness, I won’t have any truck with imported asparagus in the depths of winter, because apart from the nasty business of food miles, it’s just not the same. At this time of year, the markets and shops are positively bursting with bunches of fat spears of asparagus. I buy as much of it as I can afford and eat as much of it as I can. I never seem to get sick of it but the asparagus hit is enough to keep me going until next May.
There are many recipes involving asparagus and of course it’s good with butter or hollandaise sauce (what isn’t?) but I usually eat it very plain – lightly cooked and sprinkled with salt and pepper, often with scrambled or poached eggs at breakfast time. I don’t really see the point of an asparagus steamer since it can’t be used for anything else (if you saw the size of my kitchen you would understand why). I either simmer it in a few inches of water, or if it is particularly thick and woody I cut it in half and cook the tips in a steamer and boil the bottoms in the same pot (which is basically what an asparagus steamer does anyway but without having to cut the stems). Asparagus is also good barbecued, which I only recently discovered at Sunday lunch at my friend Emme and Jon’s house. If you want inspiration for some fancier recipes, then look no further than May’s In the Bag seasonal cooking blogging event. There’s a further 26 asparagus recipes on the official British Asparagus website.
Now asparagus is never trivial but it is associated with some cool trivia:
- * Asparagus is also a member of the lily family, along with onions, and has been cultivated since ancient times. The name “asparagus” comes from a Greek word meaning “sprout”.
- * It’s also called ‘Hadley grass’ or just ‘grass’, particularly in Massachusetts. ‘Grass’ is sort for ‘sparrow grass’, a 17th century corruption of ‘asparagus’. The best stuff was grown in the Mass town of Hadley (and still is, if you live in New England).
- * It can make your pee smelly funny. About half the population experience strange smelling (and sometimes green!) urine after eating asparagus due to sulphur-containing amino acids in the veg that break down during digestion.
- * Asparagus can be purple or white as well as green, but the white effect is achieved by growing it in the dark. The white type is popular in mainland Europe but can occasionally be found in the UK – be warned it takes twice as long to cook. I think the white stuff is nice but the flavour is more intense with the green variety, so it depends whether you prefer a more subtle or vibrant flavour. I prefer the green stuff, personally.
- * Asparagus grows from a crown planted a foot deep in sandy soils and in ideal conditions it can grow 10 inches in a day. Oh and it has virtually not calories or fat and is full of vitamins and minerals.
[...] time too for summer food. The queen of the spring foods, asparagus, is still in season but not for much longer, now that English strawberries and raspberries are [...]