Green and White Asparagus (Asparagus officinalis) : A Source of Developmental, Chemical and Urinary Intrigue

Asparagus is one of the world's top 20 vegetable crops. Both green and white shoots (spears) are produced; the latter being harvested before becoming exposed to light. The crop is grown in nearly all areas of the world, with the largest production regions being China, Western Europe, North Amer...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Metabolites 2019-12, Vol.10 (1), p.17
Main Authors: Pegiou, Eirini, Mumm, Roland, Acharya, Parag, de Vos, Ric C H, Hall, Robert D
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
asparagus
asparagus aroma
Asparagus officinalis
Biochemistry
Crops
Environmental conditions
Flavor
flavour
Food
Herbal medicine
Metabolomics
phytonutrients
plant metabolomics
Review
secondary metabolites
Shoots
Sulfur
Vegetables
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Summary:Asparagus is one of the world's top 20 vegetable crops. Both green and white shoots (spears) are produced; the latter being harvested before becoming exposed to light. The crop is grown in nearly all areas of the world, with the largest production regions being China, Western Europe, North America and Peru. Successful production demands high farmer input and specific environmental conditions and cultivation practices. materials have also been used for centuries as herbal medicine. Despite this widespread cultivation and consumption, we still know relatively little about the biochemistry of this crop and how this relates to the nutritional, flavour, and neutra-pharmaceutical properties of the materials used. To date, no-one has directly compared the contrasting compositions of the green and white crops. In this short review, we have summarised most of the literature to illustrate the chemical richness of the crop and how this might relate to key quality parameters. Asparagus has excellent nutritional properties and its flavour/fragrance is attributed to a set of volatile components including pyrazines and sulphur-containing compounds. More detailed research, however, is needed and we propose that (untargeted) metabolomics should have a more prominent role to play in these investigations.
ISSN:2218-1989
2218-1989
DOI:10.3390/metabo10010017