1,576 easy and fully explained recipes, with +66K photos and 77 videos

This site uses only a few technical cookies necessary for its operation. By continuing to browse, you accept their use.
To find out more...

Should asparagus really be cooked in bunches?

You'll probably read recipes here and there explaining how to cook asparagus "en botte", i.e. in a small package (the famous "botte").

Is this really the right way to cook asparagus?

8,820 5/5 (1 reviews)

Keywords for this post:Asparagus Cooking Tip Bundle Legend

Last modified on: May 22^th 2024

For this post: Comment Follow Ask me a question Send to a friend

Should asparagus really be cooked in bunches?

"Botte" cooking

This is a method familiar to all professional cooks when cooking asparagus: peel the asparagus, tie it together with string or a rubber band to form a small bundle, the "botte", and plunge it into boiling salted water.

asperges en botte

Check for doneness by pricking one of the asparagus spears with the tip of a knife, and if it's easily pierced, the asparagus is done.
Remove the bundle from the water, drain and cut the string.

Is this a good method?

This method seems like a good idea, but it's not. In practice, doing it this way leads to problems with cooking levels.

Bunching the asparagus increases the overall cooking time, with the asparagus around the edges cooking faster than the asparagus in the middle, which takes longer.
This difference in cooking time means that some asparagus (again, those in the middle) may be overcooked, while those in the middle may be undercooked.
If you want to check doneness with the tip of a knife, it's almost impossible with the asparagus in the center, unless you go through the asparagus in the middle.

In short, you'll have understood that this is not a good method, and that it's much better to cook your asparagus the traditional way , in a large pot of boiling salted water, like any other vegetable.

asperges en cuisson classique asperges cuites

It's quicker and more effective.

To sum up: don't cook your asparagus in bunches, as they won't cook as evenly as conventional asparagus.

Lasts posts

Cut twice as fast

When you need to cut something long into small pieces, for example chopped chives or the stem of a spring onion, there's a simple gesture that doubles your cutting speed. Let's see how.
May 21^th 2026852

The other use for bowl scraper

Your kitchen or bakery utensils may include a horn (left) or a pastry cutter (right). These practical utensils are normally used to scoop the contents of a bowl or salad bowl - the horn - or to cut dough - the pastry cutter. But they also have another, very practical use - let's see what it is.
May 9^th 20261,207

The strange foam of potatoes in milk

As you may have already noticed, when you cook potatoes in milk, especially in small pieces (slices or cubes) for a gratin for example, a surprisingly abundant white foam forms on the surface. Where does it come from?
April 26^th 20261,438

A little leftover butter

Very often when you're making a cake, your recipe will tell you to melt some butter and mix it into the batter - a classic for cookies, cakes, moelleux and the like. And every time you do this, you'll have to butter the baking tin to prevent the dough from sticking during baking. Naturally,...
April 16^th 20261,3345

A tablet holder

Perhaps you too cook by consulting your recipe on a tablet or phone, and putting it down on your worktop? It's practical, but not the best solution. Here's a look at how you can make an inexpensive, almost universal stand.
March 14^th 20262,0575

See all posts Random post RSS feeds

Other pages you may also like

Salt and yeast

Let's take a look at an old baker's legend: You may have already read that somewhere in a recipe that uses baker's yeast(bread, pastries, leavened doughs in general) it is often specified "Don't put salt in contact with the yeast, you'll kill it (the yeast)"! Well, that's a belief, and there are...
March 15^th 201975 K4.3

Candied fruits: don't get ripped off

Do you like candied fruit? You might like to nibble a handful or add it to a recipe, like a classic fruit cake or delicious Italian specialities like panettone or sicilian epiphany pie.
June 21^th 201770 K 24.2

Cleaning endives

If you buy your endives elsewhere than in supermarkets, and in this case the best is of course from a market gardener, he or she is the one who planted and harvested them, in this case you will have endives full of earth or sand, depending on where they were grown, which is normal and reassuring, we...
March 24^th 202028 K4.6

Tranché, dissociated, failed, in short... missed!

When preparing a sauce or a cream, there's always a (small) risk that the creamy preparation you're working on will suddenly separate into two parts of different textures: a liquid part, for example, and a more or less solid part, or even become lumpy. It's terribly frustrating, but we'll see...
June 19^th 202315 K5

Toss the salad

When you've finished preparing a salad, green or otherwise, it's usually time to add the dressing and toss. It's often said to "toss the salad", which means to season and mix. Is it easy? Not so easy...
March 8^th 202414 K5