The Poet's Crop

Asparagus is not a crop for the faint of heart. It is a poet’s crop, or an artist’s.

Even more than most crops, planting asparagus requires a leap of faith, a confidence in the future, an expectation of stability, a small hope for permanence. Laying the fleshy roots – like octopus tentacles surrounding the eager bud of an asparagus spear – a foot deep in the soil, the asparagus farmer holds onto no small amount of optimism and practices no small amount of patience while closing the trenches over a crop that is years off into the future. An act of faith. Of hope. Of a potential future, as yet unrealized, as yet unpromised.

The farmer can’t help but think at this time, bearing these small burdens down into the soil, of the future. The reward of the asparagus patch does not come in the first year, when the toothpick-like spears must be let to grow to store away the sunlight for the following spring, and for many springs thereafter. Only in the second year does the farmer take a crop, and then, only a small one, just a week’s harvest to wet the appetite, to encourage the now-hidden source to divide. And in the third year, again, the farmer harvests for just two years, taking just enough of the new year’s growth to cause a little concern under ground, where the crown divides again to make more opportunities for the fern-like fronds to find their way.

This year is never the year that shows the yield of the asparagus farmer’s work. The caring, the tending, the worrying – after the brief frenzy of incredible greenness of growth betrayed, snipped off as it tries to reach above the ground – all this goes to growing large, fern-like towers, reaching overhead, inedible. Stretching for the sun all summer, dying in the fall, leaving nothing at the close of winter except bare dirt and expectations.

One day in the spring, hearty shoots slip through the earth. If the farmer is there to see it, it is joy, rows bending around the curve of a hill. Faith and hope rewarded.

Farm Happenings

Weather: We had a wet week here on the farm, front after front rolling through. But we do not complain, or wish for things to be different. The last two years have proved that the weather gods are fickle, so we try hard to be grateful for what we have.

What We Did: We transplanted more crops into the greenhouses, since we couldn’t plant them outside. The tomatoes are very ready to go into the greenhouses, and we are a little bit behind, but we should be caught up by the weekend’s end.

Comings and Goings: Inga Haugen, who grew up on a pasture-based dairy farm just a little bit north and west of here, joined our the crew this week as our harvest foreman. There is a very good chance that we have assembled an excellent crew for the coming season. Chris traveled north to Featherstone Farm in Rushford, where he attended a meeting for a regional produce transportation initiative getting started this year. He also dropped off three thousand celeriac plants that we started in our greenhouse, and brought home a used transplanter to try.

In the Kitchen

Is there any vegetable more redolent of spring than Asparagus? This week’s harvest started about two weeks later than it does most springs on our south-facing slope, and we got caught in the rain during Wednesday’s picking, but all four of us enjoyed nibbling on the stalks while we picked.

CSA member and foodie Jeanneane Jansen writes about asparagus:

Did you know that sommeliers identify asparagus and artichokes as two of the most difficult ingredients to pair with wine? It’s because they both have an unusual combination of flavor notes. (We like Rieslings with these two, or Viognier. Or beer. If you haven’t yet tried Surly Brewery’s lineup, then you are in for a treat. Surly Brewery is in Brooklyn Center, MN; thankfully some of its beers are available in MN and WI in cans. But we digress...) The following recipes play on asparagus’s contrasting bitter and sweet notes.

Basic Asparagus, with Flair
from Jeanneane Jansen

Snap off the stiff ends or peel them with a vegetable peeler. Prepare a finishing item (below). Steam the asparagus. Or toss it in a bowl with olive or vegetable oil and a little salt, and then roast it on a baking sheet at 400 degrees --- shaking the pan every few minutes --- until bright green with little carmelized sections. Or grill it until bright green with grill marks. (If you’re in doubt about whether the asparagus is done, err on the side of undercooking it. Remember that it will continue to cook as it sits on the plate. Pick up a spear by the fat end. It will go a little limp when ready. Too limp and it is overdone.)

Finishes:

A little pat of butter, salt, a squeeze of lemon juice, and a few grates of lemon zest. This is a sort of quick hollandaise sauce. Pastureland Dairy’s cultured butter is extraordinary.

A dollop of butter blended with herbs such as chives, or tarragon.

A drizzle of olive oil and chopped garlic. Warm the garlic in the olive oil until fragrant (just a few seconds), or leave it uncooked for extra punch.

A drizzle of olive oil and grated Parmesan.

A drizzle of olive oil and small bits of chopped cooked bacon (Grass Run Farm has fabulous bacon), thinly sliced ham, or Proscuitto, the crisper the better.

A drizzle of olive oil and truffle salt.

A drizzle of truffle oil and salt.

Finely grated ginger and garlic, warmed briefly in butter or sesame oil.

Because we have it in abundance, and as I noted previously our spring has been a little tricky so we don’t have the kind of diversity I normally count on to keep myself and my CSA members jazzed, we are packing a fair amount of spinach into the boxes. My idea: use one bag for cooking, and one bag for salads. Spinach makes a great addition to soups and stews, in addition to a

Wilted Spinach Salad
Great as a starter, or a standalone midnight snack.

1 lb Young Spinach Leaves
4 slices Bacon, diced
1 Tbsp Sugar
¼ cup Balsamic Vinegar
Dash of Salt
Handful Dried Raisins or Dried Cranberries
Parmesan Cheese
Fresh Ground Pepper

Place the spinach in a serving bowl, tearing large leaves into bite-sized pieces. In a skillet, fry the bacon until crisp and remove, then sprinkle over spinach. Whisk together the hot drippings (use about ¼ cup if there’s a lot left over), sugar, balsamic vinegar, and salt, and pour over the spinach to wilt just slightly. Toss with dried fruit, and serve with a generous topping of Parmesan cheese and fresh ground pepper.

Chives do amazing things in the spring. Two weeks ago, we had to harvest twenty clumps of chives to get the equivalent of twenty bunches; this week, we harvested twenty clumps to get sixty bunches. Hurray for stored solar energy!

Lemon-Chive Rice

4 cups cooked White Rice (or, the results of cooking two cups of rice)
1 bunch Chives
¼ cup Lemon Juice

While the rice is cooking, thinly slice the chives (this is one of those jobs that will tell you if your knife is sharp – chives almost jump away from a truly sharp chef’s knife [my favorite is the Wusthof 8-inch Wide Blade Chef’s Knife]). Toss hot rice with sliced chives and lemon juice, and serve immediately.

Lovage looks a lot like parsley, and a lot like underdeveloped celery. I think of it as parsley on steroids, both for its aggressive growth habit and it over-the-top flavor. If you want an herb to “kick it up,” lovage is the herb for you. Use in soups or stews, or chopped finely and added to salads, as a flavor booster, akin to parsley, but don’t get carried away. Also, the fibrous stalks should be used for flavoring but discarded before serving. Lovage makes a nice addition to vinaigrette, or, finely chopped, just tossed in with a spinach salad. The bright flavor makes it a nice pairing with asparagus, especially mellowed in a little melted butter before drizzling over.

As another approach, blanch the stalks with your asparagus; the cooking mellows the flavor, and infuses the asparagus quite nicely.

Carrots, of course, are still held over from last fall’s harvest. I am using these often in cooked dishes these days, but they still taste great raw, as well.