Broiled Asparagus and One Night Stands

Now before you get your knickers in a twist, I'm not talking about what you think I'm talking about. Well, I am talking about broiled asparagus, but the other half of the title refers to a little tip I read at a great new website recently brought to my attention called, Nourish This. Here, Kristin O'Connor says the following:


Most of us are accustomed to making a big pot of rice and saving it for the next day...or week. Either that or we get more takeout than we need for leftovers the next day. However, putting rice in the fridge after it has been cooked (especially fried rice) is like cultivating bacteria in a petri dish! Of course you can eat reheated rice and be find, but reheating greatly increases your chance of getting a nasty bacterial infection in your digestive tract...so for me I have decided rice is only good as a "one night stand!"


I had never realized that my more long-term relationship with rice could cause such a problem. Come to think of it I have been feeling rather ill recently. That is how I came to concoct the meal you see above. At the time, all that seemed palatable were potatoes. So...I started putting some in a pan when I thought about the piece of yam left over from last night's stir-fry. And there was some burdock in the fridge next to the yam that I thought would want to join the party. When I ventured into the produce drawer to retrieve the latter ingredients I was greeted by a bundle of asparagus looking anxious to be broiled.

If you have not had asparagus prepared in this manner, you have not had asparagus! Just crank that oven up to "broil" and pop in the lightly oiled green spears until you can smell their outermost layers getting singed by the heat. The result is a succulent bite of green goodness...crispy on the outside and tender on the inside. At this point, I don't recommend adulterating your asparagus with pan-fried root vegetables, garlic, scallions, salt, pepper, and nutritional yeast as I did. The asparagus is much tastier in its virginal state.

And now, after reading the above disclaimer about rice, I DO NOT RECOMMEND topping your meal off with a generous helping of rice you made last week (as I preceded to do). I'll let you know tomorrow if my long-term relationship with the grain has left me as many a committed relationship has...in a whole lot of pain.


Here's to some one-night stands,
Jenna