Recipe:Asparagus Pickled with Tarragon and Green Garlic
What would you eat for your last supper?
It's not the kind of thing I usually think about, but if forced to sort through my food memories to choose the one I'd want to repeat as I crossed the threshold to eternity, here's what I'd say:
The pleasantest meal I can recall is a softshell crab that I fried in butter and ate by myself on my porch, alone with a bottle of Gewuztraminer, to celebrate my birthday in 2008.
The most profound sensory memory I have of any food is of smelling a black truffle, Tuber melanosporum, the moment it emerged from the ground and I lifted it, caked in dirt, to my nose.
But if there is one meal above all others that captures what I hold dear about food, that embodies the abundance of nature and the grace imparted by good ingredients simply prepared, and that just makes me flat-out happy—it is jumbo asparagus.
At its best, asparagus needs only to be blanched in heavily salted water—like sea water—until transluscent all the way through, then rubbed down with unsalted butter and sprinkled with chervil grown outside my kitchen door.
This it is not a side-dish, so for my last meal there would be nothing else on the table. Not even utensils, because as Miss Manners will tell you, whole asparagus may be eaten with the fingers.
If that ain't Heaven, then tell me what is.
***
For many eaters—me chief among them—spring means asparagus. Like tomatoes, aspragaus is a food that sane people celebrate when it comes in and miss when it is gone. The very notion of eating imported asparagus in the middle of winter strikes me as the lowest and most pretentious form of faux gourmandise.
This time of the year I eat asparagus by the pound. I'd eat it every day, except that I usually run out first because the only place I buy it is from Zuckerman's at the Santa Monica Farmers Market on Wednesdays and at the Studio City Market on Sundays. (See David Karp's alarming article in the LA Times, 'Hard Times for California Asparagus.')
Contrary to what anybody may have ever told you, fatter is finer when it comes to asparagus. Freshness is the number one priority, but all else being equal, buy the jumbo-est stalks you can find. I'm a big fan of purple asparagus, but I only eat white asparagus in France, where it is like the foie gras of the vegetable world—refined, labor-intensive, artificial, tortured. So French, so delicious.
Among its many virtues, asparagus makes an exceptional pickle that brings together succulence and elegance like nothing else. Here it is preserved with its seasonal companions, tarragon and green (ie, immature) garlic.
ASPARAGUS PICKLED WITH TARRAGON AND GREEN GARLIC
for three pints
3 lbs fat fresh asparagus
1.5 cups white wine vinegar
1.5 cups water
2 tablespoons sugar
2.5 teaspoons salt
PER PINT JAR:
1 clove garlic or 1/4 of a small head of green garlic
3-inch leafy branch of fresh tarragon
1/2 bay leaf
1/2 dried red chili
6 whole black pepper
5 whole coriander seed
2 whole allspice
1 Pare the end of each stalk and peel its base,
Then cut stalks into 4-inch lengths to fit jars.
2 Prep the green garlic: peel away the outermost layer, trim and quarter.
3 Prep the aromatics: add to each prepared jar the appropriate amount of garlic, tarragon and spices.
4 Blanch asparagus in rapidly boiling water for 45 seconds, just long enough to set a bright green color and make the spears pliable.
5 If you're feeling fussy, you might want to "shock" the hot spears in an ice-water bath. Then drain.
6 Pack asparagus into the jars so that you have a snug fit, but don't overcrowd.
7 Make the vinegar syrup by combining vinegar, water, sugar and salt in a saucepan and bring to a boil.
8 Fill each jar with hot vinegar syrup, leaving 1/2 inch headspace. Wipe rims and seal. Process in a boiling-water bath for 10 minutes.
YIELD
"A pint is a pound, the whole world 'round," is what a participant in last week's class told me. And so it's true: if using wide-mouth pint jars, which I recommend, you'll get about one pint of pickles per pound of asparagus. Yesterday I put up 13 pints.
Reader Comments (15)
A girlfriend and I are appearing on a food-tv show later this month and have been struggling with the fact that it's just that wee bit too early in the growing season here, to give us free reign over local-seasonal-etcetcetc produce for our menu. Asparagus, however, is practically jumping out of the ground, and this recipe is absolutely perfect!
Great pix and instructions. I am amused to see that you, like me, have tiled kitchen counters. Mine are fire engine red, and I assume that they date from a renovation in 1983. Who thought this was a good idea??
hey kevin!
i have yet to pickle asparagus but i hope to do so soon. this is the first year that i will be able to harvest them from my garden (i hope).
i share your love of asparagus...although that fried soft shell and bottle of gewuztraminer might take first in my book. ;)
Kevin,
I remember at the Valerie/Kevin class there was something about the acidity of the white wine vinegar. 5% seems too low and that is what I have found in the market. Can you help me remember?
Thanks - Andrea
hi Andrea -- despite your moment of doubt, you remember correctly -- you should use vinegar with 5% acidity -- that's mostly what you find -- sometimes you'll see a higher acidity which is fine -- it's actually pretty unusual in my experience to see lower than 5% -- thanks for your good question! kw
Thank you,
Andrea
I just made these and can't wait to try them! How long should I wait before I pop them open?
Thank you,
Alix
This recipe sounds great and I can't wait to try it. How would you prepare it when ready to enjoy?
Hi Alix and Stacey --
both are great questions --
for optimum results, you'll want to let the pickle mature for about 2 weeks -- that's just to allow the flavors to penetrate the vegetable. i find that the tarragon, especially, needs time to really infuse the entire jar.
and as for using them: pickled asparagus is a perfect before-dinner snack. i took a jar of them to West Virginia this weekend for the ramp dig (see post dated 3 may 2010) and we ate them friday night -- straight from the jar while drinking pints of hoppy beer and standing out in a field of wildflowers. that's livin', ya'll.
but you can also gussy up asparagus pickles quite a bit: i think there's no better or more elegant pickle to go with pates, terrines and rillettes of all kind.
and finally, you can slice them into any sort of salad for piquancy. after canning class a few weeks ago, Valerie tossed them with a spring-lettuce salad. on that theme, how about a composed salad of baby frisee, sliced boiled egg, blanched fava beans and pickled asparagus? or maybe stirring a few diced spears into a chicken salad or tuna salad or egg salad? or on top of deviled eggs!
you get the idea -- they are versatile and GOOD --
thanks for posting -- must dash --
kw
hello!
i was wondering if you feel that the asparagus becomes too pickled after a certain period of time? should i try and eat all my jars in a month or so or can i keep them through until winter without biting into vinegar-sticks?
thanks
hi naomi -- that's an interesting question. i know what you mean, but what i'd say is that the pickle will never taste stronger or more harsh that the vinegar syrup it's packed in. so what i've done with this recipe is to dilute good-quality wine vinegar with water and then smooth out its edges with sugar in order to make the vinegar syrup palatable by itself. i literally tasted the syrup by the spoonful until i got it to the point when i said, '"mmm that's tasty." so when it goes in the jar with the asparagus, it adds flavor but hopefully not so much harsh acid to make for "vinegar-sticks." if anything, what i've found is that over time the vinegar mellows slightly. you should be good to keep these asparagus pickles all winter. thanks for the comment and all the best, kevin
Don't know if you're interested but I mentioned these lovelies on Twitter and http://www.punkdomestics.com/ asked if I'd submit the recipe. I told them it wasn't mine to submit but I'd pass on the request.
P.S. I opened mine after a month and they were amazing! My two jars didn't last two weeks! I saved the brine and dropped in some chopped carrots a few days ago. I've yet to try them but I have high hopes.
Alix
I will be doing these today! So you think the parboiling is necessary given the hot liquid and water bath? The last round of asparagus I did nearly seemed overcooked after the entire process and I'm thinking you might not need it? Your thoughts?
Hi Sis --
I blanch a lot of things that I'm going to pickle -- the main advantage in my opinion is that it makes the vegetable more pliable and so easier to pack in jars. Blanching also forces the vegetable to shed a bit of water, which means that you'll have less shrinkage in the jar.
As for asparagus in particular, I understand where you're coming from -- I like to use super-fat spears for pickles because they hold up better to the processing -- ie, they retain some snap and don't get that gross overcooked canned-asparagus flavor. a thinner spear will cook more.
That said, you can do without blanching your asparagus. (It's known as a cold pack.) Another good technique to manage the cooking more closely is to process your sealed jars in a hot-water bath (not boiling! -- you'll need a thermometer) at 180-185 degrees for 30 minutes. the lower heat keeps pickles crunchier --
good luck and let me know how it turns out --
kevin
Thanks for the tips. My experience backed up your point about shrinkage. On my next batch I will have to decide on the trade off or not! Check out my attempt. I followed you pretty closely and only changed the spices a bit. http://www.sisboomblog.com/2010/08/pickled-carrots-asparagus-with-tarragon.html