Fresh Asparagus, Quick Meal

Anyone else as in love with FRESH asparagus as I am?

Growing up my sisters and I HATED when the asparagus patches at our house and my grandparents' place (yes, there were two big patches of the stuff) started to grow each spring. It meant asparagus for lunch and supper...my dad probably tried to feed it to us for breakfast too but I've blocked that out.

I even remember watching my older sister put a piece of aspargus in her mouth, take a big drink of milk and swallow...not chewing the aspargus once! I aspired to that.

As we grew older, I started appreciating asparagus for what it is.

These days I'm lucky to have several sources for asparagus. My dad has added MORE asparagus plants to his garden and I have a co-worker whose garden produces a plastic grocery bag full of asparagus a DAY when the weather grows warm each spring.

Usually I just wash it off, cut it in pieces, throw it in the Pampered Chef micro-cooker with a little butter, water and pepper and heat for a minute or two.

Then I burn my tongue because I can’t wait for it to cool!

If I had a grill, I would re-create this meal, including grilled asparagus, over at How Sweet It Is.


And I’m definitely going to fix her Parmesan Asparagus Sticks with my next batch of asparagus.


However, I needed a quick and easy meal the other night and looked in the fridge and pantry to see what ingredients I had on hand. I found a rotisserie chicken from Costco (love ‘em), Uncle Ben’s Ready Rice (so easy), teriyaki and soy sauce and, of course, my asparagus.

I decided to make a quick and easy chicken fried rice with asparagus. Looking back, I wish I fried an egg and added it to the mix. Oh well, I guess I’ll have to make it again.

I simply microwaved the rice according to the directions and added it to a hot skillet with a bit of oil and some of the chicken that was cut into bite-size pieces. To that I added one-fourth cup of the teriyaki sauce and heated it through.


Then I cooked my asparagus with a bit of water in my micro-cooker for just under two minutes; drained it and added it to the skillet.

I made sure everything was heated through and served it up.

It’s not the most exciting meal but it was tasty and something different.

How do you change up the way you use the veggies that you always have on hand?