An unusual approach to growing and eating asparagus

For me, asparagus, or asparagus, is something from the field of higher agronomy.

1. It seems to be grass, it grows in the forest, and the harvest begins only in the 3rd year.
2. The harvest itself is kind of difficult: dig it out, break off the shoot at an angle or cut it off so as not to damage the rhizome.
3. There are vegetable asparagus, and there are decorative ones, some say that you can eat both, but according to other information, only vegetables are edible.
4. Growing asparagus for food is not easy. They write that it is necessary to sprinkle the shoots for bleaching, then uncoil them after harvesting.

Now, thanks to country tourism, I have found a person for whom asparagus is simply the earliest vegetable. And she grows well with him.

His approach, everything is very simple

All asparagus is edible - "Asparagus, it's asparagus in Africa!"

He does not like transplanting, so it is better to propagate it by seeds, and not by dividing the bush.

It seems that gourmets are on his side, in their opinion the most delicious asparagus from wild, not cultivated plants.

He could not grow asparagus from purchased seeds, then he took an ornamental bush from the neighbors, simply cut off a bush with their permission in the fall, strewn with berries and seeds. I threw it on my site. The seeds fell off, stratified and rose. And he threw away the bald bush.

Two more painful, neat weeding and the seeds settled down, took root. In the fall, he seated them in their permanent place. The next year, a new growth of asparagus grew, it was also carefully weeded, then planted. The bush that remained in place turned out to be the strongest. Transplanting weakens the asparagus.

He decided to sow not with seeds, but with berries. Natural stratification of seeds occurs in the berry. His asparagus multiplied naturally, as in the wild.

By the way, the neighbors laughed at his idea, thought that he would be poisoned.

Conversations with neighbors turned out to be funny:

- Do you eat this asparagus?

- Which one? This one? What are you doing!!! To get poisoned?! No! And what do they eat? Yes, it's different! You cannot eat grass. She's for flowers! If you want, come and tear yourself. There are some huge bushes.

And such a dialogue:

- Do you know the name of this plant that grows here?

- I do not know. This is for bouquets.

- You can eat it, it's asparagus.

- What are you doing! Look at the edible in the store! Pretty little white! And this one is ours. Look what a nasty green poisonous color she has. No! If you want to get poisoned, come and tear! We'd better buy a real edible one.

It was useless to persuade me. Many people plant asparagus, believing that it is a beautiful Christmas tree for bouquets. And they do not believe that all asparagus is edible, that it is the most healthy delicacy.

His opinion on white asparagus

Someone decided to perverted and spud asparagus. The result is bleached asparagus. They called it a delicacy, and everyone believed it. And then there were rumors about edible white and inedible green. In fact, green asparagus is much healthier than white asparagus. Green contains many vitamins and antioxidants.

Here is such an asparagus now on his table in the spring:

The younger the shoot, the more tender, they grow quickly, so they are sometimes harvested 2 times a day: early in the morning and in the evening

As you can see, he does not bother with the extraction of the underground part of the shoots. Because the most delicious thing about asparagus is the lump on top.

He also has his own curiosity: "Siamese" asparagus (analogy with Siamese twins):

He picks asparagus only in the spring, spares the bushes, has a conscience :)

I was very pleased with this ease of cultivation. I think he didn't succeed with store seeds because they decided to germinate next year, and they were no longer expected.

And the fact that stores don't sell such a healthy vegetable to us is also inspiring to try to grow asparagus. What is called asparagus is a processed soy product.

How he eats it

The best thing is to eat the shoots raw, they taste like green peas. But he is the one who does not like the taste of green peas, so he crumbles some shoots into a salad. Some part blanches for about three minutes in salt water. Then it tastes like young corn. And part of it is fried in oil and poured with an egg.

I would be grateful if you would share your experience of growing and cooking asparagus :)