Agretti are one of the most loved vegetables of the spring season, easy to prepare and rich in benefits and properties. Their delicate taste also likes children and it is possible to eat them raw or simply cooked steam
With the arrival of spring it is time to sift the farmer’s market in search of the freshest and most delicious ingredients of the season. Among these, the Agretti certainly stand out, who, depending on the locations and regions, are called with the strangest names including including friar beard And mustard of the monks (who knows why this religious call!) But they are always those Mazzolini in which the bright green filiform leaves of the botanically known plant are collected as Soda Sales.
Historical curiosities
The agretti or beard of friars played a crucial role in European industrial history, in particular in the production of glass and soap. This alaphous plant, capable of thriving in saline soils, was cultivated above all in the coastal regions of the Mediterranean, such as Spain and Italy, for the extraction of the soda (sodium carbonate) from its ashes. In Venice, the purity of the Murano glass depended on the quality of the soda obtained by the Soda Sales. The Venetian authorities, aware of the importance of this resource, promoted the cultivation of the plant in the lagoon, recognizing its strategic value for the local glass industry.
The importance of the soda sauce declined with the advent of the Leblanc process in 1791 and subsequently of the Solvay process in 1861, which allowed the synthetic production of soda to lower costs, reducing dependence on plant sources.
Property and nutritional values
The agretti, a typical vegetables of the Mediterranean basin and the spring season, offer excellent nutritional properties. First of all they are very rich in water and help our body to remain hydrated but at the same time a purify Since this vegetables tend to stimulate diuresis.
The agretti are of course rich in vitamins A and B and of mineral salts including potassium, football, magnesium and iron (therefore useful to eat them even in case of anemia).
I am then rich in fiber and consequently they stimulate intestinal functions and have a fair laxative effect.
Nutritional values
According to the composition tables of the foods of the creation of a 200 gr portion of boiled agretti (without salt) contain:
| Nourishing description | Value for 100 g |
Value by portion 200 g |
|---|---|---|
| Water (g) | 91.0 | 182.0 |
| Protein (G) | 2.1 | 4.2 |
| Grassi (G) | 0.2 | 0.4 |
| Cholesterol (mg) | 0 | 0 |
| Available carbohydrates (g) | 2.6 | 5.2 |
| Soluble sugars (G) | 2.6 | 5.2 |
| Total fiber (G) | 2.7 | 5.4 |
| Soluble fiber (G) | 0.48 | 0.96 |
| Insoluble fiber (g) | 2.22 | 4.44 |
| Minerals | ||
|---|---|---|
| Nourishing description | Value for 100 g |
Value by portion 200 g |
| Football (mg) | 124 | 248 |
| Phosphorus (mg) | 31 | 62 |
| Iron (mg) | 0.9 | 1.8 |
| Vitamins | ||
|---|---|---|
| Nourishing description | Value for 100 g |
Value by portion 200 g |
| Vitamin B1 Thiamina (mg) | 0.02 | 0.04 |
| Vitamin B2 Riboflavina (mg) | 0.12 | 0.24 |
| Vitamin B3 Niacin (mg) | 0.52 | 1.04 |
| Vitamin C (mg) | 16 | 32 |
| Vitamin A Equivalent retinol (μg) | 353 | 706 |
How many calories do agretti contain?
A portion of 200 gr of boiled agretti without salt contain: 51 kcal
How do you keep the agretti?
It is a vegetables that can only be purchased fresh and that ends easily. It is excellent, therefore, once bought, keep it for a few days in the refrigerator inside a bag of food for food and consume it as soon as possible. As with the other vegetables before you eat better is! But let’s see how to cook the agretti …
How do they cook the agretti?
Made these operations you can choose to Eating your Agretti raw, for example in the salad, or boiled, sautéed in a pan or steam cooked, personally the latter is the cooking mode that I prefer both because the nutritional properties are better preserved and because the original flavor of the agretti is maintained as the other vegetables.
A trick to make them remain of a beautiful bright green once cooked is to pass them under cold water, at this point you just have to taste them!
Recipes with the Agretti
The agretti are A perfect outline For several courses (a little oil and lemon is enough to flavor them) but they also lend themselves well to make tasty omelettes using chickpea eggs or flour (FariFrited!) Or season the pasta. Among other things, this vegetables are also perfect for those on a diet since, as we have seen, the caloric contribution of the Agretti is really very limited. Here are some recipes with Agretti:
On Agretti you can also read:
