Star chef Marcus Arnold, head chef of the Steinhalle in Bern and V-ZUG ambassador, loves green asparagus. As an expert, he knows how to retain the green colour – thus giving the asparagus even more flavour.
Asparagus is Markus Arnold’s all-time favourite vegetable. “One of the few vegetables that really is only available seasonally”, he says. “And we look forward to it all the more because of that.” He has perfected the art of preparing green asparagus. And it involves a lot of salt. Why? “Salt stabilizes the chlorophyll, making the vegetable grass-green”, says Markus Arnold. In addition, asparagus works very well when the salt content is a little higher than carrots or peas, for example. Arnold usually seasons his cooking water at a ratio of 10 g of salt to 1,000 g of water. For asparagus, however, he adds twice the amount of salt to the cooking water. Here’s his preferred method for preparing green asparagus: blanch the vegetables for 1 minute in salted water (20 g / 1,000 g water). Dip briefly in ice-cold water until the asparagus is at room temperature. Next, brush the asparagus with nut butter and season with salt and pepper. Then roast in the oven at 230 °C (convection) for approx. 5 minutes. Move them around a little as they cook and brush them once more with the butter (or with a plant-based oil), as desired. Arnold enjoys this asparagus with lardo and ponzu, which is a Japanese citrus-based sauce.