Migas de Espargos

Description: Typical Alentejo dish made from stale bread softened in hot water, to which cooked asparagus is added. This mixture is then cooked in fat resulting from the frying of the pork (pingo), until a very dry and consistent ball is obtained, with a slightly golden outer crust. Served with fried meat.

Special features: Asparagus migas are one of the many versions of this typical Alentejo recipe. Cooked and crushed asparagus is added to the bread.

Region: Alentejo.

Ingredients used: Fresh asparagus, pork, lard, garlic, red pepper paste, bread (preferably hard), salt.

Preparation: Cut the asparagus into pieces(only the tender ends), cook in a pan in waterseasoned with salt. Meanwhile, the meat is fried, which has been previously seasoned with salt, garlic, pepper pasteand lard. Once the meats are removed, add the slices of breadand boilingwater to the drippings of the frying pan or pan. Cover and let it rest. Add the cooked asparagus to the bread. Stir with a wooden spoon, over the heat until it detaches from the walls of the pan and becomes toasted.

Know-how: This dish was usually cooked at the time of asparagus, natural products of spontaneous creation and rare taste, which can be harvested in the olive groves of the plains. It is served hot accompanied by fried meat. There are variants of this recipe: you can add brains or eggs.

Forms of commercialization: Restaurants.

Product availability throughout the year: All year round.

Product history: With the arrival of Muslims to the Iberian Peninsula at the beginning of the eighth century, açorda also arrived, both among its cultural and gastronomic habits of the Arabs, and even as a custom disseminated in the emulation of the Prophet Mohammed. In the two known treatises on Spanish-Arab cuisine of the time, there are several recipes for dishes classified as thurûd, açordas. In some of these recipes, the bread is treated in order to produce a kind of mi-gas, that is, the bread is cooked in order to produce a paste (Rei, 2016).
This type of dish is often associated with wild plants, such as asparagus, used in the Alentejo for a long time, as can be seen in the eighteenth-century manuscript of Fr. Manuel de Santa Teresa, addressed to the Franciscan convert friars of the Province of the Algarves, which covered convents mainly south of the Tagus, and where several spontaneous plants that are still part of the Alentejo diet are mentioned today (asparagus, celgas, purslane) (Alentejo Gastronomic Menu, 2013).

Representativeness in local food: Dish of the vast family of migas, present in any home in the region.

Source: DGADR, based on Receitas e sabores dos territórios rurais (MINHA TERRA – Federação Portuguesa de Associações de Desenvolvimento Local, 2013), "Cozinha Tradicional do Alentejo - a memória dos temperos", Maria Antónia Goes, 2014, Colares Editora, “Carta Gastronómica do Alentejo - Monumenta Transtaganae Gastronómica” (Confraria Gastronómica do Alentejo, 2013), e Rei, António (2016), A Açorda. Uma sopa de pão, da Alta Idade Média à atualidade, IEM /FCSH – Universidade Nova de Lisboa.

Photo: Provided by MINHA TERRA – Federação Portuguesa de Associações de Desenvolvimento Local