283. Asparagus

Asparagus is a vegetable between the root and the and plant, and requires more cooking, like the latter. It should be well scraped at the bottom part, tie them up in bundles of not more than twelve heads, have ready a pot of water, say three quarts for every hundred heads, in which you have placed one tablespoonful of salt, and if the water is hard half a teaspoonful of carbonate of soda