from
Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman
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How to enjoy asparagus.
The best way to enjoy asparagus in France is also the simplest. Just order freshly boiled green or white asparagus,
Asperges au Naturel, and they should arrive “à point”, perfectly cooked. The asparagus will be served with a sauce or a selection of sauces, usually including Sauce Hollandaise, Beurre Clarifié, clarified butter, Mayonnaise Fraîche, fresh mayonnaise, Sauce Vinaigrette. Choose a dry and lightly fruity white wine, or a semi-dry wine, to accompany your asparagus, and you will not be displeased. N.B. Your fresh French asparagus may be offered with different sauces to the four I noted above, ask. It is accepted that without any other clarification on the menu listing that white asparagus is being off served. Green asparagus will be explicitly noted. White green or violet all cultivated asparagus spears are usually seen when15 cm – 20 cm long.
Green asparagus.
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Asparagus is perfectly cooked when a slight bite is required, much like perfectly cooked pasta. N.B. “Á point”, in French,(pronounced ah pwa) means “perfectly cooked” and is the term used for any food that is perfectly cooked including steaks.
Asparagus on French menus:
Asperges Blanches – White asparagus.
Asperge des Bois or Asperge Sauvage - Wild asparagus.
Asperge Fraîches - Fresh asparagus.
Asperge Tiède - Warm asparagus.
Asperges Vertes – Green Asparagus.
Asperges Violettes- Purple-tipped asparagus. (Violetto d'Albenga).
Pointes d'Asperges - Asparagus tips.
.
Asperge au Gratin – Asparagus served with Sauce Mornay and then sprinkled with cheese, usually Gruyere or Parmesan and lightly browned under the grill. A Sauce Mornay is a Béchamel (Bechamel) Sauce, one of the original mother sauces of France, with added egg yolks and Comte AOC or Gruyere cheese.
Green asparagus.
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Asperges Blanches aux 2 Jambons, Sélection de 3 Sauces – White asparagus served with two different cured hams and a selection of three sauces.Cured hams are added just before serving; they would lose their taste and teture if they were cooked with the asparagus.
Foie Gras et Asperges à la Gelée de Sauternes – Fattened duck's liver and fresh asparagus served with the natural aspic from the cooking juice flavored using a sweet white Sauterne wine.
Velouté d'Asperges Blanches - A velvety white asparagus soup.
Tranche de Filet de Quasi de Veau, Girolles et Asperges des Bois, Réduction de Bois de Réglisse. A thick slice of a veal roast is prepared with girolle chanterelle mushrooms and wild asparagus. All are served with a reduced sauce made from the natural cooking juices and flavored with licorice root. The cut called a quasi is unique to France. It takes extra time to prepare, but the diner's know they are being offered a tender and juicy roast. There is no North American or UK equivalent to a French quasi and on French menus, the cut will only be seen with lamb or veal.
Green asparagus soup.
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Celebrating the new asparagus season.
In many areas of France, at the beginning of the white asparagus season, the asparagus farmers will work together with local vintners, chefs, sommeliers, and restaurateurs. Together they will choose a local nouveau white wine to recommend accompanying the new asparagus crop. With a number of colleagues, I was lucky to be in a restaurant when local chefs, vintners, and asparagus farmers were meeting to choosing the new wine. Since we had visited this restaurant many times and I had driven them crazy with requests for food history and more we were already friendly with the chef and staff. The chef invited us to join the wine and asparagus tasting and give our opinions.
N.B. We learned that you cannot expect to find an excellent or unique Nouveau white wine, but the overall bonhomie allowed us a wonderful time tasting and dining. We couldn't give a genuine opinion after the fourth or fifth tasting of these very young wines from different vineyards so we just cheered and raised our glasses so that no vintner had his or her feeling hurt. Four different chefs were sharing the kitchen and we tasted asparagus served in at least ten different ways. That made me realize again and again how creative French chefs may be.
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The various groups of professionals at this dinner awarded each other prizes for the wine’s compatibility and for new recipes that had been created. More importantly, after the prizes had been awarded we all ate some more asparagus and then toasted each other again with the chosen wine. This was repeated joyously again and again by the judges to be sure they made the right choice of the winning recipe. Only then could we head home to bed. Luckily we had a designated driver!
Asparagus Country.
In the asparagus growing areas, at the beginning of a new season, mostly outside the large towns, restaurants will offer special menus dedicated to the season’s new asparagus. The French white asparagus season begins toward mid-March and continues through May with imported asparagus and hothouse varieties available before and after those dates.
If you love asparagus then, in the season, seek out the asparagus growing areas with good restaurants outside of the big towns. Some of these local restaurants offer an asparagus entrée that may be close to 300 grams; I can testify to having eaten an over 500-gram ( 1.1lb) main course. Vive la saison de l’asperge!
White asparagus isn’t better than green, nor is green better than white. In most French kitchens, chefs will use white and green asparagus, each in its season which in any case overlap. I believe that white asparagus wins, on a combination of taste and texture, but when no white asparagus is around I am happy with the green.
Asperge Violet - Purple or Violet-tipped asparagus.
Violet Asparagus is an Italian hybrid developed naturally over two hundred years; now it is also grown in Provence and elsewhere in France. This asparagus is slightly sweeter than the green asparagus. Its attractive violet coloring is only skin deep and under its violet coat, it is pale green to white much like green asparagus. The violet asparagus is sweeter than the white or green varieties. Thin spears of violet asparagus may be eaten raw and are often part of a salad.
Asperge Sauvage - Wild asparagus.
Wild asparagus, in its season, that is May and June in France, will be on some French menus. Occasionally it can be slightly bitter, but normally it is an excellent and enjoyable treat. When you do find wild asparagus, I am told that it may easily be transferred it to your garden where it will continue to grow. Some French market gardeners grow wild asparagus for restaurants and you will also see it on sale in farmers' markets. Wild asparagus may also be used to flavor other dishes, and when thinly cut it may be served raw in a salad. However, my choice for wild asparagus is when it is lightly cooked whole and then served with just beurre clarifié, warm, melted, clarified, butter.
Wild asparagus in the market
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What makes white asparagus?
Without intervention, all white asparagus if left to its own devices would be green. It is the method of growing that created white asparagus; as the asparagus spear breaks the surface the farmer will cover the growing spears with earth. In this manner, the growing asparaguses, covered with earth are not exposed to the sun's powers and the chlorophyll that would be generated and turn the asparagus green. When the white asparagus spears are long enough, like green asparagus, they will be cut and sent to the market. I enjoy asparagus of any color, but the asparagus cognoscenti in France will tell you that the white asparagus is less bitter than the green, and the texture is more delicate. I consider white to be slightly milder in flavor and usually more tender than green asparagus.
As you enter more deeply into the world of asparagus you will see and taste the difference. The best hybrids from green and white look different and some of the white European apparatus grow very thick. The thickest white French asparagus may be the equal of 4 or 5 normal spears and the thickness does not affect the taste, only the cooking time.
The different thicknesses of white asparagus
seen in a French market.
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I grew up in the North of England, and we grew hot-house, greenhouse, green asparagus. I remember when the first plants were being prepared I was told that we would not see any edible asparagus for three years, but then the same plant will supply new spears year after year. For a young boy used to picking mushrooms and berries in the woods and scrumping apples from our own and our neighbors' orchards, three years is a long time. However, I survived the wait and can vouch that that first asparagus was worth waiting for. Apart from different tastes and textures asparagus may be on the menu when baked, grilled, steamed or boiled, and in the summer barbecued. When in France. I met up with wild asparagus I quickly added it to my list of enjoyable asparagus varieties; wild asparagus is green, with a different look and very slightly sweeter than the cultivated green
variety.
For those who are new to the asparagus world.
and want to prepare it themselves.
I was introduced to an excellent blog for beginning cooks and its
post on asparagus is excellent; just click here for: How to Cook
Asparagus.
Argenteuil and its asparagus.
In the history of French asparagus the town of Argenteuil takes second place to no other; Excellent asparagus, green and white is now grown all over France; however, two hundred years ago the most famous French asparagus, and the most famous recipes for asparagus came from the town of Argenteuil and the asparagus that grew all around.
Argenteuil is near to Paris, in reality, today it is a Parisian bedroom suburb. Argenteuil is in the department of Val-d'Oise in the region of Ile-de-France. As the crow flies Argenteuil is less than 10 km (6 miles) from the center of Paris and via train under 15 minutes to the St Lazare Station. However, with by car, it is 21 km (13 miles) and according to Google Maps that is a 45-minute drive!
The Knights of Argenteuil
Many well-known dishes created for asparagus or asparagus based sauces come from Argenteuil and are named after the town. Of course, there is a society, similar to a confrérie, dedicated to improving the world through the asparagus of Argenteuil. You may request to join the Compagnons de l’Asperged’Argenteuil, The Companions of the Argenteuil Asparagus.
Dishes named after the Asparagus of Argenteuil include:
Crème à l'Argenteuil – A cream of Argenteuil asparagus soup.
Velouté d’Asperges Argenteuil aux Crevettes Grises de la Mer du Nord – A velvety soup made with the asparagus from close by Argenteuil and served with those small and succulent sand shrimps from the North Sea.
Tourte Argenteuil - A pie made with a pâte feuilletée, the pastry used for croissants. Here, a pie will be baked with asparagus, eggs, often with added ham, and usually, it is served as a main course. This pie will often be served with a Sauce Mornay although sometimes another sauce may be chosen.
Painters in Argenteuil
Claude Monet lived off and on in Argenteuil from 1871 until moving to Giverny in 1880; Argenteuil is less than 40 km away from Giverny. In Giverny, Monet would create his magnificent garden. Meanwhile, while living for nine years in Argenteuil Monet painted, as may be expected, some famous paintings and the name of the town Argenteuil is on many of those. However, the most famous asparagus paintings from Argenteuil were those of Edouard Manet’s.
Edouard Manet’s: Bunch of Asparagus
Painted in Argenteuil.
The original painting of a bunch of asparagus led to the painting of its equally famous companion, and the story about that second painting’s creation. The second painting was of a single asparagus spear. The story behind this second painting of a single asparagus spear relates to Manet’s surprise at the high sum a collector, Charles Ephrussi, offered and paid for the first painting of a bunch of asparagus.
Edouard Manet’s painting of L’Asperge
The single asparagus.
In gratitude for the price paid, Manet painted another single asparagus spear, and this he gave, as a gift, to Ephrussi. When he gave Ephrussi the second painting, he noted that considering the amount paid the original was missing, at least, one spear.
The original painting of the bunch of Asparagus by Manet can be seen, if it isn’t on loan when you visit, at the Wallraf-Richartz-Museum, Fondation Corboud, Cologne, Germany; that is also Cologne’s oldest museum. The painting of the single asparagus, just called L’Asperge, may be seen in the Musée d'Orsay, Paris; along with another 48 of Manet’s works.
Other artists who lived in Argenteuil included Renoir and Sisley; if you are passing through Argenteuil, you may visit one of the two houses Monet lived in during his extended stay in the town. Ask for directions at the Tourist Office.
In the last few years, Argenteuil has been in the news, unfortunately, not with praise for its asparagus, rather, for the town’s social and economic problems. Argenteuil has become one of the high-unemployment areas with a large immigrant population. That means angry, dissatisfied and unemployed, second and third-generation children of North African immigrants. Monet, Manet, Renoir, Sisley and the others would be most upset.
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Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman
Copyright 2010, 2012, 2014, 2016, 2019.
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