Lily of Duality

The Double Life of Asparagus

From the moment its first white tips peak out from their underground home, asparagus lives a double life. It is the first vegetable of Iowa spring, sprouting with the crocuses. Yet, it is now available year round. In just the last 15 years, the percentage of home grown asparagus in American supermarkets has dropped from 70% to 35%. Asparagus is a lily that has grown wild for thousands of years, so much so that no one knows where it originated. It still grows wild in many parts of America, thriving along riverbanks and lake shores.

The Ancient Greeks foraged for it, like we hunt that other great harbinger of Iowa Spring, the morel. By 200 B.C. though, Romans cultivated it and had noticed its most distinctive duality. While nearly all flowering vegetables bear both stamens and pistils (male and female cells) on the same plant, asparagus has plants of different sexualities. About half have only staminate flowers; the others only pistillate flowers. Both kinds must be grown near each other if seeds are to be obtained. Our eating habits also have a dual nature.

There are just two types of asparagus to choose from, though either can be grown from the same plant. White asparagus, the favorite of Europe and particularly of Germany, is protected in the field from sunlight by reflective tarps. Green asparagus, the American choice and dominant variety of Iowa, is never covered, so that sunlight turns the spears green with chlorophyll. Similarly, about half of us prefer thin spears, which grow later off a plant. The rest of us, particularly serious chefs, insist on thick spears, the early bloomers and those often from pistillate plants. The only drawback to the thicker spears is that parts of them need to be peeled.

Even the nutrition of asparagus is double faced. It is high in folic acid and a good source of potassium, fiber, vitamin B6, vitamins A and C, and thiamin. It has no fat, nor cholesterol and is low in sodium. A half cup of raw asparagus has only 15 calories. However, if you cook it, the calories increase by half again that number, as the protein increases when heated. Asparagus loses quality very rapidly after harvest; sugar content declines and the amount of fibrous material increases. Hence there are two methods of picking it. The woody lower stems of imported supermarket asparagus retard the spoilage, but must be cut a couple inches under ground level. If you pick the plant to eat it within a two days, just snap it off above ground, and eat the entire spear.

Iowa’s Best

In Germany, the white asparagus of Beelitz has a legendary reputation. The French prize that of Argenteuil near Paris, and from Villelaure in Provence. Italians cherish the spears of Bassano del Grappa and the English argue between those of Sussex and St. Enodoc. Iowans who bother distinguishing among asparaguses, are partial to that grown near Fraser, in Boone County.

Each Spring, the Greg and Polly Rinehart Family sells fresh organic asparagus at farmers‘ markets in Des Moines and Ames, and to some of the best restaurants in Ames. Greg Rinehart told us that asparagus is one of the fastest growing foods in the world. “We have a 4 acre field of asparagus, it’s 20 years old now. We pick asparagus daily because it can grow an inch an hour at 70 degrees Fahrenheit. So you can get 12-14 inches of growth overnight during a week. As the season progresses the milk weed hides the asparagus.

He gave growers these tips.

“Plant in full sun and well drained soil. Mow it over in Summer and burn it off in the Spring to stimulate growth. We grow organic asparagus, but we have 10 kids, 7 of them still living at home, so we can pick daily and weed too. It takes three years after planting before you can pick anything and four years before you have a real harvest,” he offered.

“Later in the season, to reproduce itself, the plant puts out more ferns than stalks, so you have to pick around the ferns,’ explained Polly.

“We hand weed a lot,” added Greg. Elizabeth Rinehart, 9, put asparagus harvesting in perspective.

“It sort of peaks out of ground and you just snap it off. It’s not as easy as peas though, peas are the easiest because you don’t have to get your hand dirty,” she revealed. In other parts of Iowa, asparagus growers prefer chemicals to hand weeding.

Jean and Nathan “Mac” McCrary have a large 7 year old bed in Shenandoah. Mac advises burning down the bed and disking it, which turns the soil without plowing it, before applying weed killer in autumn.

“Then, hope it rains soon after that. If it waits too long to rain, your crop will be done for by May, instead of June,” he explained.

Mac’s told us his favorite method of cooking asparagus is to cut it in 1 to 2 inch pieces and microwave it for about 2 minutes, then butter, salt and pepper it.

The Quest for Madame Pompadour’s Soup

With the perfect climate for asparagus, as well as some good dairy farms, Iowa should be the epicenter for that legendary soup, cream of asparagus. We went to half the corners of the state to visit with three of its best chefs, with different takes on the soup that Madame Pompadour used as a love stimulant. Just off the square in Shenandoah, “The Sanctuary” describes itself as “Lunch, Desserts, Coffee, Gifts, Interior Design and Landscaping.” When Jim and Lucy Clark bought this 100 year old church and Christian Science reading room, they opened as a gift shop with their offices under the stained glass windows. Then they added a few home made food items and “Now days, I don’t even do much interior design work,” admitted Lucy.

“We don’t really have a chef, instead we have about six of us who cook,” explained cook Annette Beason, who gave us her word of mouth recipe for her fresh asparagus soup.

“I don’t write things down or really measure things either, I cook the way my grandmother did. Begin with fresh asparagus, we get ours from Jean McCrary, who has a huge patch in Shenandoah and brings us about five pounds at a time. I cook about 2 quarts of cut up asparagus in a quart of chicken stock, for five minutes. Then I add a quart of 2 % milk mixed with Half & Half and stir in my roux. (The roux is made by melting butter and white flour in equal amounts and browning the mixture.) You just add enough till it thickens.” In the opposite corner of southern Iowa, Martha Wolf and Sue Saunders began selling their baked goods out of their home kitchen in Fort Madison, as a way to cope with divorces.

“It was a glorified bake sale at first, and probably as much therapy for Sue and me as anything else,” explained Wolf. By the end of 1995 they moved into a 100 year old building on 7th Street and opened the Ivy Bake Shoppe, which now draws three fourths of its business from out of town. A chalkboard menu, a screened-in porch with river views, tin ceilings, oak floors and lots of brass create a 19th century wistfulness. So does their “pure butter and cream baking,” which sacrifices shelf life for the deep flavors of yesteryear. Wolf told us that they use spring asparagus in spinach salads and quiches, but their favorite treatments are the simplest.

“Just bake them lightly and serve naked, or with dip.” she said.

She believes that asparagus soup needs some weight.

“We start simmering the asparagus in a mostly vegetable stock, with some chicken stock. Puree the mixture as soon as the asparagus is hot. This is the Ivy Bake Shop, so we add heavy cream and thicken the soup with a roux.” Joel Lopez owns Rosario’s Café and R.C.’s Catering Company in Des Moines.

He prefers a classical French asparagus soup with the most fresh and local slant in Iowa. “I cook to order on the run, like a short order cook. So I always have a beurre manie ready,” he told us as he kneaded equal quantities of the ultra rich butter from Pickett Fence Creamery in Woodward with organic flour from Paul’s Grains in Laurel.

“Use fresh picked asparagus and snap it off above the ground. You can taste the difference between fresh picked and day old. So use the freshest asparagus you can find. I make my soup by sautéing shallots, garlic and onions in oil, then just barely browning the beurre manie, while simmering cut asparagus, without the tips, in chicken stock, about ten minutes. Then blend the asparagus and stock, and fold it into Pickett Fence’s (un-homogenized, antibiotic and hormone-free) cream, in the top of a double boiler. Stir in the sautéed vegetables and the beurre manie until it thickens. Add some asparagus tips when you serve it,” he explained.

Ivy Bake Shoppe’s Asparagus Spears with Tomato Basil Dip

Asparagus

4 pounds asparagus, stalks peeled and rubbed in olive oilSea salt and lemon pepper

Dip

1 cup mayonaise
Half cup sour cream
2 Tablespoons tomato paste
Juice from half a lemon
Half a cup of chopped fresh basil

Bake asparagus in 350 degree oven for 8 - 10 minutes, making sure they are still stiff.Blend the mayo, sour cream, tomato paste, lemon juice and basilServe spears with the sauce on side for dipping.

Food of Love?

Before asparagus was used for food, it had quite a reputation as a medicine for the prevention of bee stings to heart trouble, dropsy, toothache and, particularly, as a sexual stimulant.

~ A 16th century Arabian love manual gave an asparagus recipe.

~Jacob Boehme developed the “Doctrine of Signatures,” in the 1600’s. Supported by Paracelsus, the father of chemistry, this philosophy believed that God made herbs and plants resemble those parts of the human anatomy they were intended to aid. Hence, the phallic asparagus was the Viagra of the Age of Reason.

~In 18th Century France, Madame Pompadour ordered asparagus soup for sexual vigor.

~In his book “Food,” Waverley Root devoted a entire section to the sex life of the asparagus.

~Casanova, Rasputin and Princess Diana were reported to believe in sexual properties of asparagus.

Planting Tip

Asparagus is best grown from 1-year-old plants or "crowns" planted in January or February. Crowns grow from seed planted in flats or peat cups in October, for January transplanting, or they are transplanted from an existing asparagus bed. To get healthy, vigorous plants, buy 1-year-old crowns from a nursery or garden center, or order them from a seed catalog. It takes 1 year to grow a good crown.

Check 'Em Out

Ivy Bake Shoppe, 622 7th St., For Madison, 319-372-9939, http://www.ivybakeshoppe.com/

The Sanctuary, 207 South Elm, Shenandoah, 712-246-5766

Paul’s Grains, 2475 340th St Ste B, Laurel (http://www.paulsgrains.com/) 641-476-3373