Roasted Asparagus

I randomly picked up some fresh asparagus to serve with one of my meals last week. I can't remember how I've prepared it in the past, but I've never had consistent results. This time I decided to pull out a cookbook for help. I grabbed my copy of Joy of Cooking and looked up asparagus. Wonder of wonders, I learned something!! It is super easy to cook asparagus and get perfect results.

First, I learned how to prepare asparagus.

After rinsing, hold each spear with one hand at the base of the stalk and the other hand an inch or two farther toward the tip. Bend the spear. It will break at the point where the tender stalk starts to toughen. If it does not snap, move your hand a little farther up the stalk and bend again until the stalk breaks.

To roast asparagus,
Preheat oven to 5oo degrees. Prepare asparagus as listed above. Arrange the spears in a single layer in a shallow baking dish (I used a 9x13 pan and drizzle over them very lightly with extra virgin olive oil. Toss the spears to coat lightly. Season with salt and pepper. Roast until tender but still slightly firm, 8 to 10 minutes.

Amazing Alfredo Asparagus Chicken

• Four to Six chicken breasts (I used frozen boneless/skinless); whichever fit well in a covered saucepan without overlapping.

• One bunch asparagus, I cut the woody part off and then cut the tops in half so they were about 1.5" long.

• One 15 oz. can alfredo sauce (I've also made my own, which is yummier, but this was super easy/quick)

• Enough pasta for six servings. I used a "summer" pasta that was a macaroni weight, so it was nice and light.

• 1 small red-onion, diced to a nice size, not too small or it will just mush

• Salt, Pepper, granulated garlic, oregano (dried)

• Butter
Saute the onions in butter over medium-heat until semi-translucent, scrape to the side, add more butter and turn up the heat to high. Sear the chicken in the butter (both sides), forming a nice, brown crust.

Spinkle the chicken with salt, pepper, galic and oregano. Redistribute the onions around and on the chicekn, lower the heat to low-medium and cover.

Cook the pasta until ALMOST cooked, it should still be somewhat stiff. Drain, then put back in the pot with the alfredo sauce, warm the sauce over low-heat while the pasta finishes. Do not boil.

Remove the chicken from the sauce-pan (cover and keep in a warmed oven, or use a separate skillet for the next part).

Add a couple of tablespoons of butter to the chicken fat and onions in the sauce-pan, turn the heat up to medium, and then add the bottom, woodier parts of the asparagus. Add the tops of the asparagus to the pan once the bottom halves are almost halfway cooked, and then scrape the entire pan into the pasta and alfredo pot.

The asparagus will be soft but not slimy when it's cooked. If there is a large diameter difference between the bottoms and the tops, cook the bottoms until they're mostly done before adding the tops in, the tops (esp. the crown) will cook much faster than the woodier parts.
Serve.

Product Weigh-In:

If you have a Costco, and can get some of this pasta, it comes with two other macaroni weight

shapes and is AWESOME with light sauces. It's called something like their "Summer Collection" and was fairly inexpensive (esp. considering it's organic).

When pairing it with an alfredo sauce, I found that the twists were just heavy enough to stand up to the thicker sauce, but they didn't grab too much of it in a bite, so you were getting a balance of asparagus, alfredo and

pasta, vs. some thicker pastas (like fettuccine) that would outweigh the sauce+veggie duo.