Asparagus season is well and truly here, which inspired Seven Sharp’s Lucas de Jong to learn all there is to know about the nutritious spears.
Welcome to Asparagus 101.
Asparagus season is in spring. It makes your pee smell, and Kiwis usually love it in two ways: with a slathering of mayo in a white bread wrap or boiled to a floppy existence.
But could asparagus graduate from a soggy side to the star? From a morning tea finger food to a canapé that people would be proud of?
I wanted to change how we consume this divisive spring sprig and challenge our Kiwi taste buds to experiment more.
Treats of Taupō
At Taupō’s first-ever food festival, there was no shortage of exceptional pallets when Seven Sharp swung by.
“We’ve got 23 events and specials going on over the first week of the September school holidays,” said Fleur Wolstenholme, the lady behind Treats of Taupō.
“This festival’s all about trying to get people out into local hospitality venues and using local ingredients.”
It was the perfect place to see if chefs and food trucks would push our understanding of asparagus consumption.
Time for the asparagus takeover – but first, I needed some asparagus.
The grower
In this job, I’ve met growers from all over New Zealand, and you quickly realise if they’re in it for the paycheck or the passion.
Iain Trotter is a passionate man whose father and grandfather have been in the asparagus game for decades.
“Generally, Labour Weekend is when everything fires up. This year, everything has happened about three weeks early.”
The asparagus we eat is actually a flower bud.
“It’s from the lily family. The only edible lily,” explained Trotter with a flair of factoid delivery that he’s no doubt dropped into a conversation before. However, rarely would it have fallen on such keen ears as this vegetable nerd.
Trotter explained that the asparagus crowns hibernate under the soil all winter, turning their carbohydrates into sugar.
So when the weather warms up, and those first sprigs appear above the surface, they’re always sweeter than the late-season harvests.
“Now’s the best sweetness. The big fat spears are nice and tender because they have so much sugar in them.”
If you pick all of the plant’s flower buds, it will not be able to store energy for the next season, so the food industry came up with a number of picks a commercial grower should do before the next season is hampered.
“Generally, you pick it 72 times. Over years of research, that’s what they’ve come up with. The optimal pick is 72.”
Misconceptions
Three common misconceptions: Bigger isn’t better. The “woody end” needs to be thrown out, and it’ll make your pee smell.
Chef Olivia Moore was perched behind piles of her cookbook That Green Olive at Market Central.
As the Seven Sharp cameras neared, she saw her chance to appear on national television, but she needed to pass the test — did she have an asparagus recipe in her book?
“Oh, I do! This one, ” she beamed proudly, displaying it for us to see. “Scissor-cut noodles with garlicky leek and asparagus.”
That was the easy part. Olivia must teach the nation how to combat the woody bottom of every large asparagus spear.
“They do need a little more cooking,” she said.
“Even a recipe like this, when cooking in a pasta sauce or tart, you need to slice them up a bit thinner and cook them a bit longer.”
According to Trotter, if the asparagus is fresh, a big shoot is just as tender as a skinny one. Often, a long haul in coolstores after picking creates that thick, flavourless chew.
And then there’s the pee. Asparagusic acid is responsible for the distinctive, sulphur-like odour that can appear as quickly as fifteen minutes after eating asparagus.
However, due to the complexity of human genes, not all people make the smell, and only a small proportion of people can smell it.
Not just asparagus rolls
Carolyn created a raw asparagus seaweed roll at the Purple Cat food truck. Its cashew butter and alfalfa sprouts perfectly supported the dish’s star: a tender raw spear of asparagus.
“More nutrients, powerhouse, crunchy, crispy delicious!” Carolyn beamed as I devoured it in three quick mouthfuls.
Another vendor had mixed asparagus into an Indian dosa – a lentil wrap with curried vegetables and coconut chutney.
It’s a foreign vegetable in one of our most populous countries, but its ability to hold its shape and flavour means it works wonderfully without being lost in the strong spices of Indian cooking.
But at Simple Somethings, they’d gone that extra step. They baked it into one of their famous breakfast scrolls — a brioche dough folded through the perfect amount of asparagus chunks — enough to give texture and flavour without overwhelming the dish. With bacon, an egg, and a dollop of hollandaise, it was a full breakfast that embraced the seasonal sprig.
Ironically, the three dishes made were all roll varieties: a roll, a scroll, and a wrap.
Maybe we are so ingrained in our knowledge of certain types of vegetables that it’s hard to change our mindset.
If you take one thing away from this lesson, let it be: Don’t overcook asparagus. Don’t even cook it. Find a fresh spear and eat it.
That’s asparagus.
