News from Rachel’s kitchen: It’s a sad day
Rachel Green preparing British Asparagus in her kitchen
What a sad day! No, I’m not referring to the football, but the end of the British Asparagus season.
The longest day of the year was last night, which means, unfortunately, it is the end of the season. This is why British Asparagus is so special in the culinary calendar of any cook because the season is so short.
For those of you wanting to know why the Asparagus growers stop cutting their crops, even when the asparagus is still growing, the reason is that it shortens the life of the asparagus beds. The crowns need enough time before the nights draw in to replenish themselves for next year's harvest. Those growers, who are greedy this year, will be needy next year!
This weekend at the Green household, we have had a final asparagus feast. I took the asparagus and baked it in cream and parmesan and served it with fresh wholemeal soda bread, absolutely delicious.
Make sure you make the most of this final week, treat yourself to asparagus everyday and try out one of the many fabulous recipes on the website.
With the start of Wimbledon, this is a perfect opportunity to try Pimms and asparagus in the sunshine, but remember your umbrella, just in case.
Thank you for reading my blog, I’ve really enjoyed writing it and I hope you’ve managed to try out some of the British Asparagus recipes I’ve featured over the last few weeks.
Love from Rachel xxxx
The end is nigh!
Sadly, the asparagus season is coming to an end. There's still plenty around but unfortunately not for much longer.
It's just 4 short days left until the end of the glorious British Asparagus season next week on the 21st of June.
Here at British Asparagus HQ, we're sad that the end is nigh for our favourite vegetable for another year.
However, we are still cooking and eating as much as we can and grabbing as many bundles of the delicious spears at our local asparagus farm.
You can still pick up the most delicious, fat juicy asparagus stems at your local asparagus growers' farm gate or farm shop or down at your local supermarket.
If you're at your local asparagus growers' farm, Elaine Lemm, editor of the British and Irish food blog recommends not just going for the lovely big succulent spears but looking for the box at the back full of twisted, mishapen ones. Not only are they much cheaper to buy but they can be cooked now ready for eating later in the year.
Elaine's recommendation is that the tips are best eaten now to enjoy them at their best, but the stalks, once the woody end is trimmed, lightly cooked, pureed and frozen are a godsend later in the year. The purée makes a great base for a delicious asparagus soup.
Elaine also recommends warming the purée and adding sea salt and dash of olive oil to make a great side dish for meat or fish. The puree can also be stirred into warm mashed potatoes or added to a casserole or pie mix - sounds absolutely delicious!
We love the idea of being able to enjoy the British Asparagus season long after it's over by buying as much as you can now and cooking and freezing it to be enjoyed in a variety of dishes throughout the year.
Now's the time to stock up before it's too late!
Deborah Bartlett, British Asparagus team
Pregnant pause
It's a little known fact that asparagus is one of the best vegetables you can eat if you are expecting a baby or planning to get pregnant.
That's because asparagus spears are packed full of folic acid - an essential ingredient for unborn babies, protecting them against neural tube defects (NTD). NTDs are the result of a baby’s spine not developing properly in the womb. A well-known NTD is a condition called spina bifida which causes paralysis and death in 2,500 babies each year.
Folic acid is a B vitamin occuring naturally in foods such as beans and pulses (e.g. chickpeas, lentils), green vegetables and yeast and beef extracts. It is also necessary for blood cell formation and growth.
Just a few spears of asparagus can make a huge difference. In fact, an 80g serving provides 60% of the recommended daily allowance of folic acid, which can also help expectant mothers stave off infection and boost iron absorption.
British Asparagus is loaded with nutritious vitamins, minerals, calcium and fibre and is extremely low in calories.
An important point to note is not to overcook your asapargus - this destroys the folic acid. Steaming is a far gentler method of cooking than boiling if you are looking to maximise your folic acid intake.
So, if you or anyone you know is expecting a baby, then get down to the shops and buy some asparagus spears while you can!
Deborah Bartlett, British Asparagus team
Asparagus predicts the future!
Forget crystal ball gazing, tarot cards or tea leaves, the latest way to predict the future is to read asparagus!
Jemima Packington from South Gloucestershire is the world's only fortune-telling asparamancer, using asparagus to make predictions for everything from sport to politics, to the Royal Family and the world of celebrity.
Jemima explains: "When I was about eight I made my first prediction having dropped some asparagus on the kitchen floor during a family meal. The pattern the stalks made seemed to make some kind of strange sense to me and, just as someone might use cards or runes to interpret forthcoming events, I found myself making a prediction."
So accurate are her methods that Jemima predicted the demise of Gordon Brown two years before he left politics for good. She said: "Every time I concentrated on Gordon Brown the asparagus broke and my prediction was that he was in trouble and would be going - so the asparagus helped me to predict his demise accurately. For me, his election failure had been in his destiny for a long time."
Jemima also accurately predicted a hung parliament after the General Election and that David Cameron would form a minority government.
Unfortunately for English football fans, Jemima predicted earlier this year that England will go out in the first or second World Cup round so it is not looking promising for Fabio Capello and his team!
For the Royal Family, Jemima has predicted that there will be a Royal engagement surprise and also a high-profile Royal health scare or death and in the crazy world of celebrity, Jemima has a few shock predictions: Susan Boyle will announce her engagement and Cheryl Cole will reveal she is pregnant but there will be speculation over who the father is!
Promisingly, Jemima predicts a hot British summer with an extended heatwave which will see a meltdown in many cities. So you've been warned, head for the coast when temperatures start to rise!
Here at British Asparagus HQ we don't know much about the fortune-telling properties of our favourite vegetable but what we do know is that British Asparagus is the finest in the world and we will continue to feast every day until the end of the season next week!
Deborah Bartlett, British Asparagus team
News from Rachel’s kitchen
This weekend it was Open Farm Sunday and I was down at a fruit farm in Tiptree, Colchester demonstrating simple dishes with local ingredients, including asparagus.
The response I received when six children tried asparagus for the first time was one of sheer delight!
When they ate my asparagus fritters and asparagus twiglets, one of the parents said: “Oh, they won’t eat asparagus” and I said: “Just let them try it and if they don’t like it, that’s fine, but if they do it’s a bonus.”
The children sat and ate the whole plateful and asked for more!
Asparagus is not just a grown-up vegetable as it is sometimes portrayed but is very much a family-friendly bunch of spears which can be used in many family meals.
There are some great recipes for families on the British asparagus website.
My favourite recipe for kids and for me is runny boiled eggs with asparagus soldiers - enjoy!
Love from Rachel xxx
Rachel Green preparing British Asparagus in her kitchen
Interview with an asparagus grower
This week, we've been chatting to Ronda Morritt, our Yorkshire-based asapargus grower extraordinaire and Mum of two.
Ronda has been growing asparagus since 1998 when she started with just one acre on her 300 acre farm in Sand Hutton, a few miles outside York. Ronda had been happily pursuing a career as a manager in a large department store before leaving to have her first baby. After getting back on her feet, she decided that she wanted to go back to work but wanted to be at home as much as possible to care for her young son.
She explains: 'I needed to find something to do. We thought about offering pick-your-own strawberries, but we called in an expert and he advised us there were too many people already doing that round here. But he said we had the perfect sandy soil for asparagus.'
So, Ronda decided to give it a go. With very little knowledge of asparagus growing, she planted her first acre in 1997, left it for two years to help build up the underground crowns and then started selling it from a toy box outside her farm gate with a chalk sign saying 'asparagus for sale' to passers-by.
'It was just a sideline to keep me busy but every morning we'd sold everything we'd harvested by 10am, so we knew we were onto something!'
Today, Ronda grows 12 acres of asparagus, producing some 12-15 tonnes of asparagus per year. Much of her asparagus is still sold at the gate of Low Moor Farm with the remainder going to local shops and restaurants, including one with a Michelin star.
According to Ronda, this year's asparagus season is going really well. She comments: "We are having a great season and the few hot spells we've had have given us a few good 'flushes' with plenty of asparagus spears to cut. We're very happy with what we've harvested so far. At the moment, sales have dropped off a bit but we're not too worried - this always happens mid-season as many people have had their fill. We can guarantee that we will get another rush when people realise that the season is about to end!
"There hasn't been too many challenges to deal with this year. Our staff are performing really well - mainly due to the fact that we've upped our training levels this year. The crop suffered a bit from the cold initially and we estimate that the frost halted growth for about four days or so, but we just got through it and got on with it!"
The British weather is always very changeable and this season, growers have had to contend with below average seasonal temperatures, However, recent weather conditions have been excellent for asparagus growers, as Ronda explains:
"The recent hot, dry spells have been absolutely fantastic. On a sunny day, our asparagus spears can shoot up as much as six or seven inches in a day! The lovely warm, sunny weather has given us a great quality asparagus spear - and lots of it! As a result, cutting is going well although the past few days of heavy rain haven't been so good. It's swings and roundabouts with the great British weather we have to contend with."
Asparagus growers sometimes have to deal with unusual requests at the farm gate and this year has been no exception. "One day we had a number of female German visitors turn up at the gate asking for white asparagus. We had to explain that in the UK, we grow the green variety which surprised them as white asparagus is very common in Germany. They also asked us for spinach and again we had to disappoint them as we've never grown spinach!"
It's fair to say that once asparagus comes into season in Britain around mid-April, it generates a fair bit of attention in the British press. This year, Ronda has been the focus of lots of media attention with journalists flocking to Low Moor Farm to interview Ronda and witness for themselves the cutting process, ride in the asparagus-picking buggies and learn more about the intricacies of asparagus growing.
We asked Ronda how she was finding it being a 'media darling'! She says: "The media coverage has been brilliant and it was so exciting when Christa Ackroyd from BBC Look North came to visit the farm. The Daily Mail came to visit us too and ran a whole page on the launch of the British Asparagus season and how we grow our asparagus here in Yorkshire. We had a great day and enjoyed their visit immensely. The 'Londoners' enjoyed themselves in Yorkshire too!"
Ronda clearly loves asparagus and is passionate about growing fresh, good quality seasonal British produce.
"The thing I love about growing asparagus is eating it - every day in the season! My favourite way to cook it is roasted with a little olive oil and some sea salt. it just need to be popped in the oven while you pour yourself a glass of wine, relax for ten or fifteen minutes and then tuck in with a knob of butter and some Parmesan shavings. Delicious!"
We think Ronda and all our growers across the UK are doing a great job growing the finest asparagus in the world and standing up as ambassadors for the industry as a whole in the national media. Well done guys!
Deborah Bartlett, British Asparagus team
Ronda Morritt, Low Moor Farm, Sand Hutton, North Yorkshire
News from Rachel’s Kitchen
I have been enjoying the short hot spell of sunshine and this started me thinking about the history of asparagus. The asparagus name comes from the Greek word asparagos – it’s native to the eastern Mediterranean region.
The Greeks and Romans loved eating it in season and apparently dried it to eat in the winter months. The Greeks believed it had medicinal properties. But the Romans brought it to England and by the 16th century all the royal courts were mad for it. By the 17th century, asparagus was being grown commercially and one of the main areas it was grown in was Battersea in London. They called it Battersea Bundles!
But by the 19th century London was becoming too built up, so asparagus fields were established in the Vale of Evesham, Worcestershire.
I love the fact that asparagus is a member of the lily family. Under ideal conditions, it can grow an astonishing 10 inches in a 24 hour period. It is rich in Folic acid, potassium, fibre, vitamin B6, vitamin C and thiamin.
Asparagus was considered an aphrodisiac and in Culpepper’s Complete Herbal, written in 1652, he states “asparagus stirreth up bodily lust in man and woman”.
I don’t know about that but it always stirs up delight in my kitchen. The other day we were all working on a big catering event so I cooked spelt asparagus and pea risotto for lunch with a huge salad for all in the kitchen. We sat outside in the sun for a while eating this feast and felt like we had eaten like Kings.
Asparagus is available and affordable to everyone these days and is certainly not just for Kings and Queens. But it is only cut until Midsummer’s Day so get cooking those historical spears!
Love from Rachel xx
Season’s Greetings!
Well, it's more than half way through our wonderful British Asparagus season - and what an eventful season it's been!
Part of the beauty and mystique of fresh British Asparagus is that we can never quite predict when the season will really get going and when there will be full availability in the shops. This is because the growth of asparagus is entirely dependent on soil and air temperature.
The end of April and the beginning of May saw the UK experiencing unseasonably cold weather with temperatures well below seasonal averages. With low day time and night time temperatures, the British Asparagus crop produced significantly lower volumes and the season was delayed by some two and a half weeks.
During the delay, some of the big supermarkets were roundly criticised for stocking imported asparagus during the British season and this was particularly the case in the Vale of Evesham, one of the biggest regions for asparagus production, when local consumers were dismayed to find Peruvian asparagus on their shelves.
Here at British Asparagus HQ, we support the major retailers in their endeavours to meet consumer demand. The UK retail sector is a huge supporter of British Asparagus which is widely regarded to be the finest in the world. It was just unfortunate that due to the chilly weather, the British crop wasn't quite ready and UK growers just couldn't keep up with the initial demand.
At the time, the Asparagus Growers' Association (AGA) issued a statement to explain the reason for the gap in supply and to show their support for UK retailers. Spokesman Adrian Barlow said:
“We support the multiple retailers’ decision to stock imported asparagus to meet their customers' needs until British Asparagus becomes fully available. This ensures that retailers have product to keep up with consumer demand and that they maintain shelf space for asparagus which can then be used to merchandise British product as soon as it becomes available.
“The best things come to those who wait and the Asparagus Growers’ Association, British Asparagus growers and the retail industry alike will be keeping a close eye on temperatures over the coming days and keeping our fingers crossed that we will see a return to full availability of domestic asparagus in the next week or so when UK consumers can experience the delicious, intense flavour that British Asparagus is famous for.”
So there you have it from the horse's mouth! The big supermarkets were not deliberately shunning British Asparagus but seeking to satisfy the huge increase in demand across the UK for asparagus during the season.
As Adrian quite rightly said, sometimes the best things come to those who wait and I'm sure you'll agree that our delicious, flavoursome British Asparagus was certainly worth the wait!
Sending you our very best greetings of the season and we hope you're enjoying it as much as we are !
Deborah Bartlett, British Asparagus team
Asparagus bundles fresh from the ground
‘Asparamania’ continues in the Vale of Evesham
No other place in the UK celebrates the British Asparagus season quite like the Vale of Evesham where the local 'Gras' is so highly revered and rejoiced that entire Bank Holiday weekends are set aside to mark the occasion!
Last weekend on Bank Holiday Monday, some 8,000 visitors made their way to Bretforton to enjoy a fun-packed British Asparagus day with cookery demonstrations, local arts and crafts, farmers' market, vintage motor cycles and cars, fire eating, sheep shearing, Barn Owls, cider making, not to mention 'Gus the Asparagus Man'!
Nigel Smith, landlord of The Fleece Inn which hosts the British Asparagus Festival, said of the event: "It has exceeded all our expectations - we have had a fantastic turnout and some amazing exhibitors. I hope everyone, without question, had a brilliant day and is now 'asparagussed' out!"
The good news is that if you missed last weekend's event, it's not too late to take part in a final celebration of the finest asparagus in the world if you are in the Vale of Evesham vicinity.
Tonight from 7pm, you can go along and enjoy an open air service at Bretforton Church in the company of the popular Bretforton Silver Band.
This will be followed by an auction of the Vale's world-famous 'Gras' which often sells for record prices. In fact, last week's historic auction with auctioneer Colin Jelfs and attended by celebrity auctioneer Adam Henson from the BBC Countryfile programme saw the asparagus hitting up to £50 a bundle! The fantastic news is that it was all in a good cause with the money raised going to the village band.
With 95% of last week's visitors to the festival unequivocally stating that they will be returning next year as they had such a wonderful experience with the 'best ever' asparagus, it looks as though the Vale's annual asparagus celebration is set to go from strength to strength.
Watch out folks - 'asparamania' is here to stay!
For more information on the festival visit http://www.britishasparagusfestival.org/
Deborah Bartlett, British Asparagus team