Spear parts (+recipes)

Asparagus. Photo / Babiche Martens

My culinary genius hasn't only been applied to the tables of a restaurant dining room but to a home production factory of trendy baby food.

When my daughter Cassandra was 18 months old she became one of the world's youngest gourmets, eating a diet of lightly flavoured Moroccan vegetable puree, a dice of cheese and a fistful of blanched fresh asparagus.

I was so proud of her asparagus consumption that I would announce to the world her daily munching activities. It was an enviable position to be in, especially as many families struggle even to get teenagers to eat their greens.

But alas, I made a dreadful mistake. By being overzealous with asparagus then, now at 11 years of age, she detests the smell and promises to eat all her peas if I leave this wonderful spring vegetable off her plate.

Asparagus is a member of the lily family. The spears grow from a crown planted in sandy soils and can shoot up 25cm in a 24-hour period. However, asparagus is usually not harvested for the first three years to allow the crowns to develop a strong, fibrous root system. Well cared for, they will reproduce for up to 10 years.

The arrival of asparagus season is a highlight of the vegetable calendar and the fresh ones do put the canned version to shame.

Sweet and tender white asparagus is the star of the line-up. And when using the green and Italian purple varieties, I look for stems with undamaged tips and a minimal amount of woody ends.

I find snapping the asparagus ends at their natural bend can actually waste a lot of the better part of the stem, so instead I cut with a knife and will lightly scrape the ends with a vegetable peeler if they are thick-stemmed.

Any stems I don't use straight away, are wrapped in a clean, very damp Chux cloth secured with a rubber band and then left to stand a bowl of slightly sugary water in the fridge.

Pencil-size asparagus is lovely eaten raw but to cook asparagus, stand the bunch with a rubber band just below the tips in boiling salted water - one litre of water to one tablespoon of salt for about three minutes. The steam will cook the tips.

Asparagus loves being partnered with hazelnuts, lemon, cured hams, poached eggs, grilled tomatoes, dark balsamic vinegar or vincotto and lines up well beside fish and veal.

This sesame asparagus is inspired by the philosophy of cooking from Shunju, Tokyo, where they cook in an open-air kitchen with that morning's harvest.

The other dish calls on the coastal breeze of Sicily with flash poached asparagus in olive oil flavoured by roast chilli and anchovies.