White Asparagus substitute

Best substitute

Jarred or tinned white asparagus

Use the same amount by drained weight as the white asparagus you are replacing

Best for Spargel with Hollandaise

Different texture

Jarred or tinned white asparagus is the substitute that actually tastes like the thing, and it is sold year round in German, Polish and Dutch groceries; drain it, rinse it, and warm it through gently in butter rather than boiling it again. If you want something fresh, use the thickest green asparagus you can find, peel the bottom two thirds, and cook it far more briefly, accepting that the dish will taste greener, grassier and more mineral. Salsify, sold in German shops as Schwarzwurzel or winter asparagus, is the closest match in both texture and mildness if you can get it. Understand what Spargel is contributing before you swap: it is a mild, sweet, slightly bitter vegetable with a soft yielding bite, and its job in a classic plate is to be a gentle canvas for butter, Hollandaise and ham. Anything assertive will overpower the sauce that is meant to be the highlight.

Other white asparagus substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Thick green asparagus, peeled at the base
Different taste
Use the same amount by weight
Ordinary green asparagus, chosen as thick as possible so it behaves more like Spargel.
What changes
Best for
asparagus with Hollandaise or brown butter, asparagus with ham and potatoes, salads, risotto and pasta, tarts
Prep. Peel the lower two thirds, then simmer four to six minutes only, until a knife slides in with slight resistance.
The everywhere-available fresh option, and a good dinner, but be clear that you are cooking a different vegetable. Green asparagus is full of chlorophyll, so it tastes distinctly grassy, green and mineral, with a slight sulphurous edge and none of white asparagus's mild sweetness or its pleasant faint bitterness. Against Hollandaise the greenness competes rather than yielding, and the plate reads as a spring vegetable dish rather than as Spargel. Choose the fattest spears you can find, peel the bottom two thirds so the skin does not turn stringy, and above all cut the cooking time drastically: green asparagus needs four to six minutes in salted water where white needs twelve to twenty. Boiling green asparagus for the time a German recipe specifies is the classic way to ruin it.
3Salsify or scorzonera (Schwarzwurzel, winter asparagus)
Different taste
Use the same amount by weight
A long slender root vegetable, black or beige skinned and creamy white inside.
What changes
Best for
asparagus with Hollandaise, buttered vegetable sides, creamy soups, gratins, vegetable ragouts
Prep. Peel into acidulated water, cut into finger lengths, simmer fifteen minutes in salted water with butter.
German cooks call it winter asparagus for good reason: peeled and simmered, it has the same pale colour, the same soft-yielding rather than crisp texture, and the same restrained sweetness that makes white asparagus such a good partner for butter and egg sauces. Its flavour is a little earthier and nuttier, with a faint artichoke or oyster note, so a Hollandaise plate tastes deeper and less delicate. Two practical warnings. It oxidises the moment it is peeled, so drop the pieces straight into water with a squeeze of lemon or a spoon of flour whisked in. And the skin exudes a sticky sap, so peel it under running water or wear gloves. Cooking time is similar to white asparagus, around fifteen minutes.
4Kohlrabi, cut into thick batons
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount by trimmed weight
A pale green swollen stem, crisp and mild, peeled and cut to roughly spear size.
What changes
Best for
buttered vegetable sides with Hollandaise, with Schnitzel and new potatoes, creamy soups, gratins, salads
Prep. Peel thoroughly, cut into thick batons, simmer eight to twelve minutes with sugar, salt and butter.
A genuinely sympathetic swap and a favourite in German kitchens in its own right, because it shares white asparagus's core quality of being mild and slightly sweet rather than assertive. Cut it into batons the thickness of a fat spear and simmer in salted water with a pinch of sugar and a knob of butter for eight to twelve minutes. The differences: kohlrabi keeps a light crispness where asparagus goes tender and slightly fibrous, and it has a clean, faintly cabbagey, radish-like freshness instead of asparagus's particular vegetal bitterness. Under a good Hollandaise with boiled potatoes and ham, it makes a very pleasant plate that nobody would mistake for Spargel but nobody would complain about either.
5Young leeks or spring onions, poached whole
Different taste
Use the same amount by weight
Slim leeks, trimmed to the pale part and gently poached until silky.
What changes
Best for
with Hollandaise or vinaigrette, cold starters, gratins, tarts and quiche, creamy soups
Prep. Poach whole in salted water for eight to twelve minutes, drain well on a cloth so the sauce is not watered down.
Underrated here, and the texture is the reason: a slim leek poached for ten minutes becomes soft, silky and slippery in exactly the way a good white asparagus spear does, and it takes butter and egg sauces beautifully. The flavour is the trade-off. Leek is sweet but unmistakably alliaceous, so the plate tastes of onion where it should taste faintly bitter and vegetal. That is fine with Hollandaise or a mustard vinaigrette and less fine in a delicate cream soup meant to taste of asparagus. Use only the white and pale green parts, split them lengthways if thick, and wash between the layers because grit hides there.
6Hearts of palm
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount by drained weight
Tinned pale cylinders of palm stem, mild and slightly fibrous.
What changes
Best for
cold asparagus salads, starters with vinaigrette, plates with Hollandaise, wrapping in ham
Prep. Rinse thoroughly to remove the tinned brine, pat dry, and use cold or warmed only briefly.
The least-bad option when nothing else is available, and its virtue is that it looks the part: pale, cylindrical, tender, sold in tins everywhere. The flavour is mild and faintly artichoke-like with a distinct brininess from the tin, and the texture is more uniformly soft and slightly stringy along its length rather than tender at the tip and firmer at the base. It will not read as asparagus to anyone paying attention. Rinse well, pat dry, and treat it as you would the jarred asparagus: warm briefly in butter, or dress it cold with lemon and good oil. Best in cold preparations and rolled-in-ham starters, where appearance carries more of the load than flavour.

What is White Asparagus?

White Asparagus is White asparagus, called Spargel or Bleichspargel in Germany and Austria, is ordinary asparagus grown under mounded soil so that it never sees daylight and never develops chlorophyll, which leaves it thick, ivory-white, mild and faintly bitter rather than green and grassy.

Cooking tips

White asparagus must be peeled and green asparagus mostly must not, and this is the difference people get wrong most often. Because Spargel grows under soil it develops a thick, tough, bitter skin, so peel every spear from just under the tip down to the base with a vegetable peeler or a proper Spargelschaeler, and snap off the dry bottom centimetre. Unpeeled white asparagus is genuinely unpleasant, stringy and bitter, no matter how carefully you cook it.
Cook white asparagus far longer than green, and cook it in a seasoned liquid. Twelve to twenty minutes in simmering water with salt, a good pinch of sugar, a knob of butter and a slice of lemon is standard, and it is done when a thin knife slides into the thickest part with just a little resistance. Green asparagus needs four to six minutes in the same pan. If you substitute green into a German recipe and follow the stated timing, you will end up with grey mush.
Do not throw away the peelings. Simmer the peels and the snapped-off ends with an onion and a little salt and sugar for twenty minutes and you have a delicately flavoured Spargelwasser, which is the correct base for asparagus soup, the cooking liquid for the next batch, and a good addition to the risotto or the sauce. This is the single best thing about the ingredient and it costs nothing.
The sugar and the lemon in the cooking water are not optional flourishes. White asparagus carries a natural bitterness in its skin and stalk, and a pinch of sugar rounds it off while a slice of lemon or a splash of milk in the water keeps the spears bright white rather than dull grey. If you are substituting salsify or kohlrabi, keep both additions; they help those vegetables too.
Match the sauce to the substitute, not to the original. Classic Spargel is designed to be understated so that Hollandaise, brown butter or a good ham can be the loudest thing on the plate. If you have swapped in green asparagus or leeks, which bring plenty of their own character, dial the sauce back a little, or add a squeeze more lemon to it so it cuts rather than competes.

Frequently asked questions

Is white asparagus just green asparagus that has not been picked yet?

It is the same plant grown a different way. Growers mound soil over the crowns so the spears push up through the dark and never make chlorophyll, which is why they stay ivory-white. That changes more than the colour: without chlorophyll the spears taste much milder and slightly sweeter, with a distinct faint bitterness instead of the grassy, mineral greenness of green asparagus, and because they grow slowly under pressure they are thicker, denser and tougher-skinned, which is why they need peeling and a much longer cook. Nutritionally green asparagus is somewhat richer, since sunlight is what builds those compounds.

Can I use green asparagus in a German Spargel recipe?

Yes, and it will be a good dinner, as long as you change the timing and adjust your expectations. Buy the thickest spears available, peel the bottom two thirds, and simmer for four to six minutes rather than the twelve to twenty a white asparagus recipe specifies. The plate will taste distinctly green and grassy rather than mild and faintly bitter, so a delicate Hollandaise will be competing instead of shining. Add a little extra lemon to the sauce, and if the recipe is a cream soup, expect the colour and the flavour to be noticeably different.

Is jarred white asparagus any good?

For most purposes, yes, and it is the only way to eat Spargel outside the short spring season. It has the right flavour because it is the right vegetable. The two things to manage are softness and salt: it is much limper than fresh and it tastes of the brine. Drain it, rinse it under cold water, then warm it through in butter for two or three minutes with a pinch of sugar and a squeeze of lemon, and never let it boil. In soups, gratins, tarts and salads it performs very well. On a plate on its own with Hollandaise, it is clearly the preserved version, but still a recognisable and enjoyable one.

Can I just leave the white asparagus out?

Not from a dish named after it. Spargel mit Hollandaise, Spargelsuppe and Spargelsalat are all built around the vegetable, and there is nothing left if you remove it. Where it appears as one component of a larger dish, such as a spring tart, a risotto or a plate with Schnitzel and potatoes, you can leave it out and the dish still works, though you lose a mild sweetness and a soft textural contrast. In that case replace it with something in the same register rather than something bold: young leeks, kohlrabi, peas or broad beans all keep the spirit of the dish.

When is white asparagus in season, and is that why I cannot find it?

Almost certainly yes. In Germany and Austria Spargelzeit runs roughly from mid-April to the twenty-fourth of June, and outside those ten or eleven weeks fresh white asparagus is very hard to buy anywhere, including in Germany. Elsewhere in the world it barely appears at all, though Dutch, German, Polish and Turkish grocers sometimes import it in May and June, and farmers markets in temperate regions occasionally grow it. If you are cooking a Spargel recipe out of season, jarred white asparagus is the practical answer and peeled thick green asparagus is the fresh one.

Related substitutes

More vegetables & aromatics substitutes

White Asparagus substitute

Other white asparagus substitutes

2Thick green asparagus, peeled at the base

3Salsify or scorzonera (Schwarzwurzel, winter asparagus)

4Kohlrabi, cut into thick batons

5Young leeks or spring onions, poached whole

6Hearts of palm