MY FAVORITE SPRING VEGETABLES

Asparagus, sugar snap peas, artichokes, scallions, arugula, and fava beans

I asked a friend, Deb Hardison {Deborah Hardison Art+Design}, to create this piece for my wife, Sara, months ago, knowing little about the future then and how the sunflower, the national flower of Ukraine, would be a stoic reminder of that country's sad journey of late.

Asparagus

I’m no forager. I’ve only foraged for morels once and wild asparagus once. I did both in Minneapolis. I foraged morels around Lake Harriet downtown. As for the asparagus, in Deephaven, a far western suburb. In October 1976, my wife and I purchased a house there for a whopping $34,900 with gigantic $1,000 down payment. Sometime later I ventured outside only to discover a couple of stalks of wild asparagus near some bushes in the yard. That find launched an expedition around the neighborhood, but I was only to find a few more stalks. It dawned on me: “This is why asparagus is grown by farmers!” If I depended on foraging, I’d never come up with enough for even a meal. Of course, asparagus grows on the West Coast, in the midwest, and across the South, so all across the U.S home cooks enjoy its charms.

While I like thin green stalks the best, eating green or white or purple, fat or thin tender stalks of asparagus is one of my favorite ways of ushering in the new season. Boil or steam, roast, grill, saute, stir-fry or raw, asparagus is also one of the most versatile ingredients. You can enjoy it raw in a chopped salad, tossed with pasta, pureed in a sauce, or blended into a soup.

One of my all time favorite food writers or cookbook authors is Michael Ruhlman. He likes asparagus in a dish of fried (or soft-boiled) egg and pasta. In one of his books, Ruhlman’s Twenty, he writes about that dish . . . “[F]inding myself with a good bunch of asparagus, I thought, ‘I'll bet pureed asparagus makes an excellent sauce for pasta. But still it's going to need a little oomph. Hmmm. Perhaps some freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano . . . I was hungry, and the dish needed a little extra something, which in so many instances is solved simply by adding an egg. Oh hell, why not mount a good deal of butter into that beautiful pureed asparagus and top the plate with a chicken's egg’ . . . an absolutely fabulous, intensely asparagus-y pasta topped with more asparagus, cheese, and a fried egg.”

The very clever popular British chef, Jamie Oliver, another favorite, has 47 asparagus recipe suggestions online, including: in avocado hollandaise, with pan-fried duck breast, in summer vegetable lasagne, with rustic gnocchi, in raw spring salad, with poached egg and fresh smoked salmon, in a mixed fish grill, and with crab linguine.

For her part, TV personality Martha Stewart offers 34 ways to cook asparagus. Serve with miso-tahini dip, salmon and leeks cooked in parchment, pea and asparagus salad, linguine and egg, and leek and gruyere quiche.

Then there’s Mark Bittman, an iconic food writer, offers 12 asparagus recipes. Bittman: “The recipes . . . assume 1 ½ to 2 pound of asparagus, which will feed four, but adjust up or down as necessary. Both thin or thick asparagus will work here; it’s really just a matter of preference. The thin ones cook almost instantly and you don’t have to peel them; the thick ones are sturdier and have an incredible snap, and are better if you take the time to peel them (but honestly, I don’t always). Whichever you use, you’ll want to cut the bottoms off; I snap one by hand to see where the natural break is, then chop the rest of the ends off with a knife in one fell swoop. I prefer crisp-tender asparagus to soft, but either way, it’s done when you can pierce the thickest part of a spear with a sharp knife without much resistance. This might take less than five minutes for very slender asparagus, twice that for thick ones.”

Major websites, such as one of my favorites named Saveur, also offer tantalizing asparagus recipes: scrambled eggs with crab, charred with egg salad, roasted morel-rubbed chicken with charred lemon, and with potatoes. The Spruce Eats, another on my hit parade has these recipes: French style crudites, white chicken lasagne, air fryer salmon, microwave seasoned, refrigerator pickled, stir fried, chowder, crepes, and broiled. Or checkout delish, which has 46 recipes. If you’re still in search of a recipe, march over to Yummly online . . . and up pop 22,365 asparagus recipes. Among them are asparagus easy roasted, grilled with prosciutto or bacon or bacon & shrimp, garlic lemon, parmesan, honey balsamic, asparagus pickles, soup, frittata, risotto, soup, omelette, quiche, pasta, gratin, rolls, gremolata, tart, taco, marinated, casserole, baked, gingered, fries, crostini, keto, or tabbouleh.

One last thing. I’m a longtime fan of Thomas Keller. If you ever have the chance to enjoy his cooking, you’ll know why. As a result, I have purchased two of his notable MasterClass videos in which he gives cooking lessons for home cooks. On one, he offers instructions to blanch asparagus to what seems like perfection. If you don’t want to pop for the class, you can catch most of it here on YouTube.

Sugar Snap Peas

Sugar snap pea recipes from Martha Stewart and from Taste of Home. While I like them very much, I also quite fond of Chinese pea pods. I’ve grown them in the past. Particularly amazing, just like a tomato eaten right after having been picked off the vine, are snow peas eaten that way. It’s only after you’ve eaten them that way will you know their delicate essence.

Artichokes

Artichokes are the tantalizing bud of a flowering plant. I’m so fond of their sweet, nutty flavor, artichokes are on the menu at my home twice a week these days. I’ve been looking for baby ones this time of year at farmers’ markets. If I’m lucky, I’ll find small ones instead. But I find even giant ones wonderful! Check out these artichoke photos and recipes on Instagram for more ideas.

It’s a bit early for the East Coast and midwest seasons, but in California, the artichoke season is upon us. While in-season artichokes are great, some people think frozen artichokes are just fine. The other nice thing about frozen is that there’s no need to trim tops and leaves or scoop out the choke.

There are an abundance of recipes for artichokes online, and include dip, stewed with beans and peas, braised hearts with ham, wine, and lemon.

Scallions

The Spruce / K. Dave

Crunchy spring scallions are more than just a garnish. While I’m a big fan of red onions, too, it’s hard to put into words just how fond of simple raw scallions I am.

I slice both their white bottoms and green tops and put them into egg salad. My mental recipe calls for one scallion for each egg and for each small-to-medium potato. I only add salt and pepper and mayonnaise and am orthodox about not eating the potato salad until the next day after all the flavors have magically come together after such aging. Popping open a can of tuna fish packed in olive oil and grabbing a handful of scallions is one of my favorite lunches, only supplemented with mayo, salt, and pepper. And grilled scallions are a favorite of many. Here’s a trick for storing them.

Arugula

Arugula is one of the finest of all greens. It has a place in any salad in my book. I find that mixing it with other greens for its pungent peppery boost is every bit as satisfying as using it alone in a salad. If you want to try your hand on growing arugula, click here.

For more information . . . .

Here are two fabulous roundups of spring vegetables at The Spruce Eats and FOOD52 . . . . More on white asparagus, a variety grows entirely underground, deprived of sunlight, which gives it a very fine texture and its color which remains white. This recipe is with luxurious bottarga at Alma Gourmet . . . . And what about purple asparagus? Like its white counterpart, purple asparagus is mild in flavor but sweeter than green. Purple asparagus is also nuttier in flavor. When cooked, purple, stalky vegetables taste resembles a blend of barley, almonds and artichokes . . . . Eating Well has an idea for you . . . . I haven’t written anything about fava beans, fresh or dry. that’s because it’s only once in a great while do I ever find them fresh in a grocery store or at a farmer’s market. But I do like them a ton. So I hope you find this helpful: Italian Food Forever. And as you might expect, Yummly has a bushel and a peck of recipes for fresh favas.

What I'm Reading & Watching

Stanley Tucci, author of Taste: My Life Through Food, has become something of a foodie of the first order following his recent TV hit culinary adventure, Searching for Italy, and food-focused cult films such as 1996’s Big Night and 2009’s Julie & Julia. This memoir is a deep dive into a sparkling career. Season 3 of the enchanting Searching for Italy is expected to be released by CNN later this year.

Bon Appetit’s March 24, 2022 issue lists 19 food movies. About one, it says: “Watching Big Night is like observing my dream dinner party play out before my eyes. People dance, they drink, they lay on a table in a food coma . . . and—of course—they eat! Most of the movie focuses on one big night when a pair of brothers from Italy throw a blowout party to attract a famous Italian American singer in the hopes that it boosts their struggling Italian restaurant in New Jersey. My stomach always grumbles non-stop when I see the brothers serve course after course of a decadent meal that ends with an incredible baked pasta known as a timpano.”

Also from that issue of Bon Appetit is another must-read-or-watch is Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat Pray Love: “This feel-good film, based on the 2006 namesake memoir . . . is a feast for the senses. The author, burned-out from her divorce and big corporate life, takes a year off to travel through Italy, India, and Indonesia to find herself . . . . The first third of the film is set mostly in Rome, where she eats salmon-hued gelato on a stone bench with some cute nuns, wanders through a food market to watch butchers hack passionately at cuts of meat, takes Italian lessons with the delicious Giovanni over plates of golden fried squash blossoms, and hosts a Friendsgiving with her new pals. It’s a dreamy, romantic reminder that food fills us up in more ways than one.” This year is the 10th anniversary of the book.

Just last week, the HBO Max limited bio-series Julia launched. The Chicago Sun-Times says it “[F}eels like a freshly baked, lovingly prepared and deliciously entertaining dish, focusing on the first season of Child’s television show.” Also, the newsletter Gawker takes a deep dive into this charming bio-series.