Continuing my effort to document how I cook stuff so I can remember how to make it consistently here is another recipe I’ve started doing regularly.

Rochto and I are asparagus fiends. I always did mine the tried and true awesome way of a couple tablespoons of olive oil and salt and pepper in a sauté dish and cook to where it’s al dente and a beautiful bright green. Recently I got creative.

Ingredients:

1 pound long stalk green asparagus
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons fig or vanilla or lavender infused sweet balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon cracked black pepper
1 teaspoon sea salt

Not many people realize that you don’t cook the whole asparagus stalk. I mean, you can if you want. But the bud down to the natural breakpoint is the good part. Take each stalk and grasping at the base of the bud’s tip, and the other end, bend the stalk till it breaks. So do that for each stalk. If the stalks are super thin (my favorite actually) you can cheat and cut the top third or so off for cooking. Preheat the oven to 300 degrees.

In a shallow baking dish combine the olive oil, salt, pepper, and vinegar and asparagus. Toss everything so that the asparagus is evenly coated and laying relatively flat in the dish. Toss it in the oven for 12-15 minutes. At the 15 minute mark, take it out and toss the asparagus again to recoat everything, then crank the oven to broil >500 degrees and blast the asparagus for 3-4 minutes. This is going to heat the olive oil to splatter level so be careful when you tend to it. At the end the tips and parts of the stalk should be very lightly blackened. Remove, set aside and let cool.

You end up with a lightly crunchy texture but the exterior has an awesome roasted/salty/tangy/sweet flavor that accentuates the natural flavor of the asparagus. It’s become my normal way to make it and it’s awesome+1. Enjoy!