Asparagus stir-fry packs flavor
One of the first things I learned with respect to vegetables was the difference between a boiled taste and a sautéed, fried or roasted taste. The chef who showed me this assumed — correctly — that I didn’t know anything about food or cooking at the time and spoke very slowly, enunciating clearly and accompanying his words with a cooking demonstration.
“This is a raw asparagus stalk,” he said, holding a raw asparagus stalk in my face. He had me taste it: it tasted grassy and sulfuric, bitter with a hint of sweetness. He dropped the asparagus in boiling water, cooked it for a couple of minutes and plunged it into ice water. He dried it off and handed it to me and had me taste it. It tasted slightly less grassy and sulfuric, and the relative prominence of the sweetness and bitterness seemed to have been reversed.
He then cut up a few stalks of asparagus and sautéed them in butter until they were softened and lightly caramelized. I tasted them again. A complex sweetness predominated and the sulfuric and grassy flavors lingered as well. It was a lesson I’ve never forgotten.
If you want your cooked vegetable to taste as close to the raw vegetable as possible, then boil it (and of course, if it’s a green vegetable, shock it in ice water if you want it to stay green and stop cooking). With asparagus at the height of its season, this makes the best sense.
If you want to intensify or transform the flavor, roast it, deep-fry it, sauté it or even char it. This makes more sense when the vegetable is not at its peak, especially toward the beginning or end of the season, when the bitter, sulfuric flavor of asparagus seems to predominate.
Asparagus has a strong, distinct flavor and holds up well against similar flavors in Chinese cooking, as in this stir-fry of asparagus with dried shrimp (which you can find in an any Asian market), fresno chiles, ginger and garlic.
Stir-Fried Asparagus with Dried Shrimp, Chiles and Ginger Serves 4 as an appetizer
Ingredients 2 tablespoons canola oil 1 pound pencil asparagus, bottom inch discarded,
cut on the bias into 1 inch pieces 4 cloves of garlic, minced 1 2-inch piece of ginger, peeled and minced 1 red Fresno chile, minced 2 tablespoons dried shrimp, minced 2 tablespoons light soy sauce 2 tablespoons rice wine vinegar 1 tablespoon sweet chili sauce 3 tablespoons water or chicken broth Directions
Heat the canola oil in a large sauté pan or wok over high heat. Add the asparagus and toss to coat with fat. Cook until caramelized and softened, about 3-4 minutes. Add the garlic, ginger and chile and cook until fragrant and softened, about 2 minutes. Add the shrimp, soy sauce, vinegar, chile sauce and water or chicken broth. Bring to a boil and reduce until thickened.
Divide the asparagus among 4 small dishes or serve family-style.