ASPARAGUS 



19 



IS cooked, and have never tasted well-grown Asparagus freshly 

 gathered and properly cooked. Another error is to suppose that 

 only foreign produce is blanched, and our own green. The practice 

 of the market gardeners of London has for many years been to 

 blanch the shoots for most of their length. What they send to the 

 London market is excellent in flavour, and has the advantage over 

 the French of freshness. It may be useful to state here that French 

 cooks boil the very fine Asparagus in bundles standing on end 

 in the water, leaving an inch or so of the points above the water. 

 This enables them to thoroughly cook the stem, without destroying 

 the tops. These, if not enough cooked by the steam, are readily 

 finished by laying the bundle on its side for a few minutes. — R. 



VARIETIES OF ASPARAGUS 

 are pretty numerous, or perhaps it would be better to say that 

 every district in which its culture is successfully carried on has 

 given its name to a kind more or less distinct. It is owing to 

 this circumstance that we have such names as Asperge de Gand, 

 A. de Marchiennes, A. de Vendome, A. de Besancon, etc. We 

 shall describe only those kinds which appear to possess some really 

 distinctive characteristics. 



Common Green Asparagus. — 

 This variety appears to come nearest 

 to the wild Asparagus ; the shoots 

 are more slender, more pointed, and 

 turn green sooner than those of any 

 other cultivated kind. 



Giant Dutch Purple Asparagus. 

 — The shoots of this variety are thicker 

 and more rounded at the end than 

 those of the preceding kind. They 

 are only tinged at the points with rose- 

 colour or violet-red as long as they 

 are not exposed to the action of light. 



White German Asparagus. — 

 Closely resembling the preceding 

 variety, this is generally considered 

 to be a little earlier and is somewhat 

 more deeply coloured, but the differ- 



ence is so trifling that the two 



Giant Dutch Asparagus natural 

 size). 



varieties may be safely pronounced 

 identical. 



Early Giant Argenteuil Asparagus. — This very handsome 

 variety, obtained by selection from seedlings of the Giant Dutch 

 Purple Asparagus, forms the greater part of those fine bundles of 

 Asparagus which are so much admired in the Paris markets in 



