Spring cravings

It’s March, which means it’s time to awaken from our winter slumber. Nature has started producing all our spring favourites again. Although some are available all year round, seasonal produce is simply at its best when it’s in season. What are FavorFlav’s spring cravings? And what do we do with them?

Hop shoots
The shoots of the hop plant, the main ingredient in beer, are the very first primeur vegetables around mid-March. Worldwide, these hop shoots are thrown away, since it’s the hop cones that matter for beer. But in Belgium, they are an expensive delicacy. Available to order here from the greengrocer.
How?
Blanched with a poached egg on top. Hop shoot tempura.

White asparagus
The ‘white gold’ is one of the few spring vegetables that isn’t available all year round. So we impatiently count down the days until it’s back.
How?
Traditionally with boiled new potatoes, butter gravy, ham, a boiled or poached egg and curly parsley. And make soup from the peelings. Less traditionally: roasted with capers and dill.

Rhubarb
The sour purple-green stalks are another genuine spring vegetable that is only available in (late) spring, from May onwards.
How?
Cook with some sugar and lemon juice, then spoon over custard. Rhubarb crumble. Infuse gin or vodka with it.

Juicy and crisp, as if you were eating spring itself.

Strawberries
They’re called summer berries, but fortunately the first field-grown ones arrive earlier, sometime in April.
How?
Dip in warm melted chocolate. Sprinkle generously over a scoop of ice cream or a cake filled with pastry cream. Soak in alcohol.

New potatoes
Small flavour bombs that don’t need peeling.
How?
They’re so delicious that boiling them and serving them with a butter-mustard sauce is enough. Frying them with rosemary works too.

Fresh peas and broad beans
Frozen ones do their job perfectly well, but fresh ones are much tastier.
How?
Hummus. Risi e bisi (rice with peas). Cook with fresh mint sprinkled over the top, then serve with seasonal lamb.

Turnip greens
Another vegetable that only pokes its head up briefly in spring. Deliciously crisp and juicy. As if you were eating spring itself.
How?
In a stamppot. Soup. Sandwiches.

Spring turnip/white turnip
A spring root vegetable with plenty of zing and bite.
How?
Bake in aluminium foil in the oven. Braise cubes in butter.

Morels: true spring mushrooms.

Morels
True spring mushrooms with an intensely deep flavour. Perhaps the most delicious mushrooms we know.
How?
Stir into risotto or pasta. Braise with meat, chicken or other mushrooms.

Radishes
The first field-grown ones are deliciously peppery and have a bite, unlike the watery bombs that sit on the shelves in winter.
How?
Dip them the French way in butter, then in sea salt, such as Sal de Ibiza or Maldon. Slice onto a sourdough sandwich spread with a layer of butter.

Sea lavender/sea aster
Leaves whose shape somewhat resembles the ears of lambs. They grow in areas outside the dikes (salt marshes) and have a more subtly salty flavour than samphire.
How?
Blanched and served with fish. Or tossed through a spring salad. Almost anything can go in it.