Asparagus Season Approaches

I currently have simple asparagus salads in heavy rotation, like this warm roasted asparagus salad with toasted walnuts and marinated feta. The asparagus was roasted with olive oil, kosher salt and Urfa chile, and the feta was marinated in a bit of olive oil with cumin, sumac, and crushed coriander seeds and pink peppercorns while the asparagus cooked.

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Looks delishā€¦ although not a fan of walnutā€™s taste or texture. Maybe Iā€™ll try it with pecans.

Today I experimented with pan-steaming asparagus as above, using gin instead of water, white wine, or vermouth. The slightly bitter herbal and juniper flavors worked very well. Would repeat.

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What kind of gin?

ā€¦using gin . . .
now that is about the only use I would entertain for gin!

luvā€™ them shootsā€¦

we get, time to time, white asparagus in the (USA) supermarket. regrets itā€™s usually about a hundred weeks old and not very good.

riding my bike to work, I used to buy white asparagus straight out of the field - that kind of fresh is absolutely sublimeā€¦ small advantage, that was Unter Bayern - harder to do in Pennsylvaniaā€¦
I also find that the white more adeptly takes to stuff like browned butter / other seasonings or flavors.

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Classic Tanqueray, so heavy on the juniper.

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I also did an asparagus risotto yesterday. No peas. Parm instead of goat cheese. My novelty add is that I took all the woody stems from a couple of bunches and steeped them in chicken broth for 30-40 minutes. That was my risotto liquid.

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I donā€™t know what itā€™s like east of the mountains, but weā€™re also west of the mountains like you. We dedicated 2 raised beds to asparagus years ago, but the land was bad. It was in the part of our yard that doesnā€™t drain well, and itā€™s clay to begin with. Being as they are perennials, itā€™s hard to amend the soil particularly to improve it. Last year we moved all the crowns into a different, much more raised and sunnier bed, but only 4 of 7 survived the transplant to grow again this year. Weā€™ll transplant the 2nd of the beds next springā€¦

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Asparagus soup: asparagus, ramps, chicken stock, salt and pepper. Enriched and thickened with tempered egg yolks. Amazing how a few perfect ingredients can turn into something so very good.

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Your asparagus risotto liquid reminds me of the Cream of Asparagus soup recipe from The Way to Cook.
The asparagus cooking water makes up the liquid in the recipe. That stuff is so good, hot or cold.

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OR, instead of trying to dumb down its inherent, wonderfully intense aroma (not bitter), you could just enjoy it the way it is meant to tasteā€¦ or not, if you donā€™t like it.

I find green asparagus incredibly boring compared to the German white gold, but Iā€™m surely biased, having grown up in Germany and having been one of those silly Germans who look forward to the season all year long :slight_smile:

Added benefit that it reduces waste. Itā€™s like nose to tail cooking, but vegetables.

Donā€™t get me wrong.

I love all asparagus, esp. steamed with a touch of sea salt.

I only posted it for those that find asparagus a bit, um, difficult.

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At home, I mostly eat asparagus within Hellmanā€™s and mayo. Sometimes I add it to stir fries.

I like Burmese asparagus dishes, too.

Thanks for this reference. Iā€™ve never made the JC version - sounds simple and delicious. Iā€™m tempted to swap out some of the onion for leek, since the leeks are in-season about the same time.

Just got back from the market with my first kilo of the green kind this year. Opened the bag and noticed a strong smell. ā€œNormalā€ asparagus has a much milder raw smell.

7,5 kilos of asparagus thus far. Plus 1kg of green asparagus. Havenā€™t looked at the link posted above. ā€œBitterā€? Never. Most of the time I eat it plain so that nothing can interfere with the taste!

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Spargelsuppe from REWE augmented with three stalks of white will be part of dinner tonight.

Still catching up, tho certainly never to your level of consumption.

I eat mine with drawn parsley butter, new potatoes, smoked ham or schinkenspeck. Rarely hollandaise ā€” tho I did pick up some Thomy :grimacing:

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Iā€™ve been eating lots of new potatoes and various hams with asparagus. Green/mixed herb with quark for both potatoes and asparagus.

Soup is also nice, of course.

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We wanted something light after a week of debauchery, so the Spargelsuppe hit the spot. The pieces werenā€™t as well peeled as the ones I added, though. 'twasnā€™t the worst for Supermarktsuppe with a little s&p and fresh parsley :wink:

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