My parents visited Walla Walla, WA, this weekend and stopped by our house on their way home on Sunday to drop off a treat: fresh asparagus that had been cut that morning!
Per my dad’s instructions, I soaked the asparagus in cold water until the spears were crisp. Then I snapped off each end and put them in a zipper-lock bag in the vegetable crisper in our refrigerator.
The next day, I roasted the asparagus using a simple recipe from The Old Farmer’s Almanac Garden-Fresh Cookbook [3].
We had the fresh-cut asparagus for dinner, along with chard [4] from a friend’s garden and leftover enchiladas [5]. The asparagus was phenomenal! I didn’t realize how incredible these lovely green spears taste when they are so fresh! My husband and I laughed because we both wolfed down all of the vegetables on our plate before touching the enchiladas—a first for us.
This simple recipe lets the flavor of fresh asparagus really shine.
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Roasted Asparagus
The Old Farmer’s Garden-Fresh Cookbook (page 102)
1 pound asparagus, trimmed
2 tablespoons olive oil
salt and pepper, to taste
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Spread the asparagus in a single layer on a cookie sheet and drizzle with the oil. (I just piled mine into a baking dish, and they still came out nice and crisp!). Season with salt and pepper, then toss to coat.
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Roast for 15 minutes, or until tender (time will depend on the thickness of the stalks). Makes 4 servings.
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Emily lives in the Pacific Northwest and loves spending time cooking, baking, food [8] blogging [9] and visiting Washington wineries. Two kitchen tools she couldn’t live without are her microplane grater and blue Kitchen Aid Mixer. Her most treasured food memory is her grandfather (now 93 years old!) making sourdough pancakes. Fortunately her big yellow dog, Murray, requires long walks, which gets her out of the kitchen for a bit every day.
- Cooking [10]
- Cooking & Recipes [11]