Growing asparagus: a little story about the triumph of hope over experience

I'm certain it's not meant to be quite this hard to grow asparagus. I mean, I know it can take up to four years from when you sow the seeds or young plants, before you can start harvesting. But for me, it's taken nearly 15 years to date. Huh, you say? I'll explain.

House one: a lovely large garden on the edge of Witney (Oxfordshire), backing onto fields. We built a dedicated asparagus bed, along with plenty of other veg borders, and I put in year old crowns. It was all going swimmingly, until the swimming part went over the top. Like, being flooded four times in 18 months type of over the top. After each flooding I kept adding manure and compost to make up for what had been taken away by the flood waters. But the forth time was awful on a whole extra level, when a teenage boy got caught in the flood waters behind our back garden and died (more complicated that this but I don't want to go into detail). We sold the house at a loss and moved.

House two: the garden was smaller, but I also had an allotment nearby, and we built an even larger asparagus bed there. It was all going so well, and were getting excited that the following year we were going to start harvesting the asparagus. But life decided to throw a trowel into the works. My partners company was going bust and he was going to lose his job. On top of this, my, at this point undiagnosed, ME, was getting worse and I was down to only being able to work 1.5 days a week. Oxford is very expensive to live in (pretty much London prices) and we decided to move north and make some lifestyle changes (if you want the details, visit here). So I passed on my allotment to a friend and said goodbye to the asparagus.

House three: ok, third times a charm right? Turns out it was the 'things run in threes' type of bad luck charm. The garden was wonderful, I designed it from scratch and it of course included an asparagus bed. However, we had problems with the neighbours. Again, I'm not going into detail, but they were violent and abusive to each other on a daily basis, and often towards us, and were making our life a living hell. I couldn't sit outside in the garden because the constant screaming was overwhelming. We couldn't sleep at night or rest during the day, because the screaming was on and off 24/7, along with frequent physical fights in the street at 2am. It was also extremely triggering for me and I started having nightmares again. In the end, the impact on the health of both us was too much, and we decided to sell up and move.

House four - where we live now. There are some minor hiccups, but on the whole, we think this house and neighbourhood is a winner. You'd think by now that I wouldn't jinx things by putting in an asparagus bed. Well, hope over experience and all that. After all, the bad run of threes is over. Right?

Voila! I haz asparagus bed.

The green mounds of foliage in the forefront are Astrantia (left) and Oregano (right),

then the young asparagus seedlings.

I'm growing two varieties, Asparagus officinalis 'Crimson Pacific', a purple variety, and Asparagus officinalis 'Jersey Knight', a green one.

What are the black sticks around the young asparagus? They are there just whilst the asparagus settle in, to stop naughty cats from digging around them and causing damage.

And just in case, I've added some hot chilli powder, which tends to not only stop cats, but also foxes and badgers.

Surely it's my time for FINALLY having the asparagus crop of my dreams? Well, in another three years. I hope. Sigh.

Wish me luck everyone!

Tasty winning

Asparagus Tart

A couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to win VP's cook book giveaway. I was excited not just because I won - though that was very exciting - but because this book was the kind of thing I've been looking for, for a couple of years.

The Garden to Kitchen Expert (yes, part of the very useful 'expert' series, if you ignore their suggestions to use chemicals) has over 680 recipes, covering vegetables, fruit and herbs, plus some jams, preserves and pickles, and some 'toolbox' recipes such as how to make a simple shortcrust pastry or white sauce. Each section is in an A-Z arrangement. Helpful for someone like me who likes her vegetable recipes alphabetically. Must be a hangover from working in the OED for nearly 5 years, several years ago... The recipes are also fairly simple, not long complicated instructions with a zillion ingredients, with half a zillion you've never heard of. Simple recipes suit because I like good food but don't always have time to spend a lot of time cooking.

Basically, a gardener has a heap of one veg bursting the beds, say courgette/zucchini, and needs some recipe inspiration for interesting and yummy ways to cook it. For years I've been looking for vegetable cookbooks that would have a range of recipes for that one bountiful veg (or fruit etc) glut. This does exactly what it says on the tin.

This isn't a broad review of the book - I've only tried 3 recipes so far. But I like what I've tried and I'm keen to try more. Given it is asparagus season it seemed appropriate to start there, hence the picture of my first attempt at asparagus tart. It was also my first attempt at making my own shortcrust pastry, one of the convenient 'toolbox recipes'.

I have to say it was a great success. It took a bit of mucking around to get the pastry right, but that's my lack of skill rather than the book I think. But the end result was delicious. Fresh asparagus from nearby Rectory Farm, some eggs, cream and cheese, and voila! And the pastry wasn't too bad. Maybe wouldn't pass muster in France, but it was light and crumbly when you bit into it, and the asparagus was still slightly crisp and wrapped lovingly in the egg, cream and cheese.

The other asparagus recipe was Asparagus Risotto. Up until now I've used the Abel and Cole recipe, so I was interested to try a different version. I think I like this new version better, though the other is delicious too, as this one has no cream and not so heavy.* I very lightly steamed the asparagus and it was crunchy and mixed well with the white wine, stock and butter. Ok, butter is heavy, but not as heavy as cream to me!

This cookbook gets the big thumbs up and I look forward to trying more recipes as the growing and harvesting season goes on. Thanks to VP for my very tasty winning.


*The Abel and Cole Pumpkin Risotto recipe in the same book is amazingly stunning, the cream and pumpkin were meant for each other.