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

Abstract

Asparagus (Asparagus officinalis) 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. Asparagus 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.

Grown to Be Blue—Antioxidant Properties and Health Effects of Colored Vegetables. Part II: Leafy, Fruit, and Other Vegetables

“…The edible portion of this herbaceous perennial is constituted by its spears or young stems produced by the underground crown, which may be green, green-purple, or purple when harvested above ground or white when purposely harvested before exposed to sunlight. Asparagus spears are considered a rich source of minerals [285], amino acids and dietary fibers [286], saponins [287,288], vitamins and volatile sulfur organic compounds [289], and especially of phenolic compounds and flavonoids [290], including anthocyanins that are responsible for the purple color of the bracts of green spears or of the whole spears in purple asparagus genotypes [23,154,291]. Being rich of all these bioactive compounds it is difficult to isolate the effect of anthocyanins and specific pigments, nevertheless several studies have demonstrated the antioxidant properties of anthocyanins in the species [284].…”

Asparagus officinalis Exhibits Anti-Tumorigenic and Anti-Metastatic Effects in Ovarian Cancer

“…Asparagus officinalis (ASP) is a perennial vegetable with remarkable anti-fungal, anti-hepatotoxic, cytotoxic, antimutagenic, anti-inflammatory and diuretic properties (6). The roots and buds of ASP are rich in many bioactive phytochemicals including oligosaccharides, steroidal saponins, amino acid derivatives and essential minerals, which has been used for treatment of various chronic inflammation diseases and cancers in Chinese traditional medicine (6)(7)(8). Polysaccharides, steroidal saponins and flavonoids extracted from ASP have been reported as main bioactive constituents that might have anti-tumor properties (9).…”

Antioxidant Activity and Chemical Content of Infusions of Asparagus L. Plant in Different Concentrations

“…In the literature review conducted, no study indicating that asparagus prevents carbohydrate damage was found. Considering the mineral content of asparagus (Pegiou et al, 2020;Guo, et al, 2020), the low Na content of this wild plant suggests that this plant can be used as an important food source for blood pressure patients (Table 3). Wild asparagus plant is rich in terms of potassium, calcium, magnesium and phosphorus content.…”