Hungry Hollow Happenings: All About Asparagus

Asparagus: It’s a curious vegetable, wouldn’t you say?

From wild foraged to cultivated fields, love for asparagus spans across many cultures and timelines. After appearing in some of the first written collections of recipes, as well as Egyptian artwork dating back as early as 3000BC, asparagus’ history of field cultivation begins over 2,000 years ago in the Eastern Mediterranean. Cultivated fields then began appearing in French monasteries in the early 1400s and English and German fields into the 1500s; eventually making it’s way to California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta by the 1850’s.

Today, asparagus fields are becoming somewhat of a rarity here in California, as it is a very time, water, and labor-intensive crop to produce with heavy market competition coming from out-of-country producers. If you’re interested in learning more on the decline of California grown asparagus, and the benefits of buying fresh, CA asparagus, check out this article from the East Bay Times which lays out the drop in production, and value of buying CA asparagus. If that makes you hungry for more, take a look at this Vegetable Growers News article, featuring a word from Durst Organic Grower’s Jim Durst!

In our region of Northern California, asparagus season lasts from early March – late May, flying by “faster than you can cook asparagus,” so to speak - apparently a favorite saying of Roman Emperor Augustus (He said it in Latin, of course). So, being that we’re currently in the peak of our Durst Organic Growers asparagus season, what better time to explore this beautiful spring treat a little further?

Let’s start at the very beginning: planting. There are three ways by which you can plant asparagus: seeds, transplants, and crowns. The crown is a one year old root structure, similar to a tuber or a bulb. Crowns are what you would commonly find in gardening catalogues and nurseries. It is how you’d typically plant for a home garden. On our farm we use transplants, not crowns. Crowns are too expensive for large acreages, in adition to being difficult and costly to plant. The transplants are started from seed in a greenhouse, delivered to our farm in trays with about 300 plants each, and planted into our fields using the help of a mechanical transplanter in the spring.

After planting transplants, we typically wait two years before our first harvest, allowing the plants to become established, strong, and resilient. Had you planted a crown, the wait time is only one year since the root structure is somewhat formed already at plant time. In our most recent planting we are waiting three years, as it is planted in a ‘new-to-us’ field that we are transitioning to organic. (Per the CCOF standards, we have to wait three years when transitioning a field to organic before we can harvest and sell from it.) The plants growing in this field, now in their second year, are some of the tallest we’ve seen (some reaching 6 ft!), so perhaps this extra year will become standard practice for us. Production next spring will be the teacher.

Taking the time to let the plants properly establish - enabling them to produce at a level that can sustain an intensive harvest period without depleting or straining the plant’s energy reserves - is important in asparagus production. Harvesting too soon, or too much can shorten the plant’s overall production. We put in a fairly hefty investment of time and resources into each asparagus field before we see any income from one planting. But it pays off. A healthy crop of asparagus will not only yield a heavy annual crop, but continues to be productive for upwards of 10 years (wild plants can live over 50 years!). Currently, our oldest asparagus planting in production is 9 years old and going strong.

Once planted, we let the asparagus babies grow, undisturbed, through the spring and summer. The plants spread out ferny foliage to collect sunshine and create energy through photosynthesis. This energy is stored in their root system in preparation for their winter dormancy. During this growth period, the plants will often reach heights over 5 ft tall, flowering and setting bright red seed berries (which are toxic to eat, by the way) through summer months and into the fall.

Come fall when the plants begin to yellow (frost induced dormancy), we mow their foliage and return this bank of carbon back to the soil. We then apply compost to the field, lightly working it with the mowed foliage into the soil to feed the microbial ecosystem, which, in turn, feeds the plants. We always have to be careful to not harm the roots that grow close to the soil surface.

Soil temperatures begin to drop as the days get shorter and cooler, triggering the asparagus plants to enter winter dormancy. They remain “inactive,” tucked under the soil over the winter, waiting for their cue to “spring” back out of the ground. As soon as soil temperatures warm again in spring, the crowns, using their stored energy from the year before, begin sending up new spears, resuming the cycle of growth and rest.

Once the asparagus spears begin to emerge from the soil in the spring, one spear at a time, we watch and wait until a full crop is growing - enough to make a harvest worthwhile. By the time we begin harvesting, the plants are sending up new spears every few days, with each spear growing a few (up to 7!) inches every day, depending on weather and temperature. This means we harvest daily, rotating through blocks every few days. What exactly does that look like?

We’ll let this video show you!

And now to the reason we are all so interested in asparagus to begin with: eating it!

Asparagus is a good source of many vitamins and minerals, such as vitamin B6, calcium, magnesium, and zinc. It is chock full of dietary fiber and rich in protein, beta-carotene, and many trace minerals. Asparagus has long been used and touted for its medicinal benefits, as well (diuretic, aphrodisiac, and an antidote to fatigue).

But, really, we love it because it tastes good! Raw, peeled, blanched, steamed, boiled, roasted, fried, grilled…whole spears, ribbons, bite-sized morsels, pureed…as breakfast, brunch, lunch, linner, dinner, or a midnight snack…we haven’t met an asparagus dish we didn’t like.

Here are just a few of the ways we’ve been enjoying it: