Okay, this series of blog posts is for everyone who watches a ton of Food Network but hardly cooks a darn thing. It's for everyone who owns cookbooks they hardly ever touch except for eye candy reading... Basically, reluctant chefs who love food. We would eat out every day if it didn't a) make our bodies feel gross from all the hidden MSG and butter or b) kill our bank accounts.
Since my house is always sort of chilly when it's cold out, and it is still cold out (although so much better than two weeks ago), I thought it would be a good idea to do oven-roasted asparagus--the oven would warm the house, and as a bonus, I would get to use an oven, which unfortunately is not the case at my apartment in NYC, where the oven is circa 1960s, dinky, and burnt-smelling.
This was such a fast recipe. (I don't usually associate my oven with fast recipes because heaven knows it takes me forever to bake any kind of cake, tart, or pie.)
It literally took 5 minutes to lay the foil on the pan, wash and chop the ends off the asparagus, drizzle on the olive oil, and sprinkle on the salt, pepper, and (bonus) freshly ground garlic pepper. 10 minutes at 425 degrees, and voila.
I pretty much followed Ree Drummond the Pioneer Woman's recipe and pictures here:
http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2008/11/oven-roasted-asparagus/
The pictures gave me encouragement I wasn't doing it wrong, and assurance the end-result would be awesome, even after only 10 minutes.
And it was delicious. The asparagus literally melted in my mouth. Even my dog liked it, when I fed some to her. I think I didn't expect such success because eating hard asparagus feels like such a chore. Not when it's oven-roasted, it turns out. Whoo!
Apparently, asparagus is in-season from late February to June, peaking in April. So a great time to make this discovery and get my asparagus on.
More about my love for Pioneer Woman some other time...
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