Heavenly Homemakers

Encouraging women in homemaking, healthy eating and parenting

Best and Easiest Ways to Cook Asparagus

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Hands down, asparagus has become one of my favorite vegetables. Here are (in my opinion) the best and easiest ways to cook asparagus.

The Best and Easiest Ways to Cook Asparagus

  1. Stir fry it in olive oil: Our favorite way to cook asparagus is to stir it around for a few minutes in hot olive oil in a cast iron skillet. Sprinkle on some sea salt and it tastes incredible!
  2. Roast it: Brush it with olive oil, sprinkle on some sea salt, then roast it in a 425 degree oven for 10-20 minutes or until the asparagus has reached your preferred crispiness level. Super good!
  3. Grill it: This obviously doesn’t work very well in the fall and winter, but if you throw asparagus onto the grill while you’re cooking meat in the spring and summer, it tastes amazing!

None of these methods are difficult in the least. All of them turn out fabulous tasting asparagus with very little effort.

Download a FREE Printable Veggie Prep Guide!

Beyond the asparagus, you might want more easy instructions for how to prep a variety of veggies for your family. Get lots of ideas here!

How about an easy-to-reference guide to print and post in your kitchen? As you prepare your veggies every day, give it a quick glance to be reminded of cooking times for each veggie!

What are your favorite ways to cook and eat asparagus?

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Build a Simple Veggie Flower (Great for Showers and Holidays!)

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I just came across a picture on Pinterest showing me how to carve a swan out of a melon. I highly considered giving it a try for about negative .8 seconds – mostly because I knew for sure mine would turn out looking like a melon that fell out of my cart at the store and got ran over by a minivan.

Art and food? It’s not my thing. I think life’s too short to design owls out of kiwi, grapes, peaches, and blueberries when there are so many other important ways to spend time – like looking for lost shoes and sweeping up glass after a ball has been kicked through the kitchen (details not included). Also – I stink at art. Like, I draw a picture of a bunny and my kids say, “why did you draw a picture of our mailbox?”

But. Two weeks ago I saw a picture of veggies displayed in the shape of a flower and thought to myself: I can totally do that and I should do it for Easter. And so I did. It took less than 10 minutes (no joke) and people were like, “oh look it’s a flower.” Score one for me.

Build a Simple Veggie Flower

I think this is a great idea for a springtime wedding or baby shower, and it was definitely perfect for our Easter buffet. On a regular day, however? I will be throwing down the veggies and dip like my normal non-artist self.

What You Need to Build a Veggie FlowerYum

  • Broccoli
  • Baby Carrots
  • Celery
  • Cucumbers
  • Grape Tomatoes

Putting it all together is self explanatory – if you can do it I can do it. Just look at the picture above for the “how to.” Serve with these great dips:

Ranch Dressing and Dip Mix

Easy Veggie Dip 1

Have you done much mixing of art and food? I draw the line at this veggie flower. :)

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How to Blanch and Freeze Broccoli

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There was this one day when I saw that I could order 20 pounds of broccoli for just $12.50 and we all know how much I love good deals on good produce. Then there was that other day I picked up my order and found that 20 pounds of broccoli filled a box big enough for my 10-year old to play in. This was also the day we had four basketball games and the day I wanted to make heart-shaped pancakes for my family because they might not have known how much I loved them unless I shaped their pancakes into hearts and also because it was Valentine’s Day. I  never bite off more than I can chew.

I also never can make nicely shaped heart pancakes, which is clearly another issue to tackle another day.

So there I was, flipping a triple batch of ugly heart pancakes on the griddle, packing lunches to take to our basketball games, and staring down 36 crowns of broccoli. I love relaxing Saturday mornings.

I started a pot of water boiling on the stove, flipped the pancakes, and started to chop broccoli. I almost (happy valentine’s day) slid the prepared broccoli into the pancake batter, but stopped myself just in time, took a deep breath, and got my camera because that’s how quickly my brain moves on to the next thing. I am a blogger, after all, which means that just at that moment I realized that I should probably document the project so as to share the broccoli blanching details with you.

Matt suggested I also take a picture of the heart pancakes and I was all, seriously? No one wants to see these. So instead you get to look at my pot of boiling water which mostly looks like I’m about to set my kitchen on fire. It’s just steam though, I think.

blanch broccoli 2

How to Blanch Broccoli

Step One:  Boil water. One might wonder at the fact that it takes an entire tutorial to explain this process. Don’t worry. The exciting part is yet to come.

blanch broccoli 1

Step Two:  Wash and cut your broccoli. (Told you it would get more exciting.)

blanch broccoli 3

Step Three:  Place cut broccoli into your pot of boiling water for 2-3 minutes. (This stops the aging process so your vegetables will maintain better nutritional value.)

blanch broccoli 4

Step Four:  Immediately remove broccoli from boiling water and run it under very cold water. (This stops the cooking process.)

Step Five:  Spread the cooled broccoli on a clean towel to dry. I didn’t get a picture of this. I was probably flipping ugly pancakes.
blanch broccoli 6

Label a freezer bag and fill the bag with blanched, cooled, and dried broccoli. Freeze for up to 6 months.

You can use your prepared broccoli for soups and stir fry. The work is done!

How to Blanch and Freeze Broccoli

If you have a trick for making nicely shaped heart pancakes – do tell. If you have any tasty broccoli recipes, I believe I’ve made it clear that I would benefit. And in case you’re wondering, I slept very well the night of the basketball/broccoli/ugly pancakes.

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Cheesy Cauliflower Cakes

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If it looks like a cheesy hashbrown and tastes like a cheesy hashbrown, it must be a cheesy hashbrown, right? Right. Unless it’s actually cheesy cauliflower cakes.

cauliflower cakes 2

Hey, I wasn’t trying to trick my family. Really, I wasn’t. I was planning to be completely up front and honest about the platter of cauliflower on the table. Is it my fault they just assumed I’d fried up some hashbrowns? And would you believe, when I told them that in fact, there were no potatoes in these – only cauliflower – some of my boys didn’t even believe me? Then my pickiest boy helped himself to seconds. Who am I to argue?

I’ll admit that as hard as I’ve tried, cauliflower is still not at the top of my favorite vegetables list. We all eat it steamed or roasted, but our reactions are usually something like “eh” when it comes to eating cauliflower fixed in those ways. When I found this cauliflower cake recipe and decided to play with it, I was hoping it would at least be just a little better than “eh.” To my surprise, I found myself unable to stop nibbling as I was cooking these for our dinner. These are way, way better than “eh.” I mean, my pickiest boy ate seconds. That is worth stating twice.

I believe these will be a part of our normal veggie rotation. Not only are they tasty, they’re quite easy to put together.

Cheesy Cauliflower Cakes (adapted from this recipe)Yum

Cheesy Cauliflower Cakes
 
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Ingredients
  • 1 head cauliflower
  • 2 large eggs
  • ¾ cup shredded cheddar or Colby jack cheese
  • 2 Tablespoons dried minced onions
  • ½ teaspoon sea salt
  • Palm shortening or expeller pressed coconut oil for frying
Instructions
  1. Cut cauliflower into florets.
  2. Boil for about 10 minutes or until tender.
  3. Drain.
  4. Mash with a potato masher. (I found that this created what looked like shredded potatoes.)
  5. Stir in eggs, shredded cheese, minced onions, and salt until well combined.
  6. Melt 1-2 Tablespoons of palm shortening or coconut oil in a skillet.
  7. Scoop 2 Tablespoons of mixture into the melted oil, pressing down into a cake.
  8. Fry over medium heat until brown and crispy - about 2 minutes on each side.
  9. Serve right away.
  10. Makes 12-15 cakes.
  11. (To save time, you can skip forming these into cakes and simply fry them up in a skillet in a big batch like you would do with hashbrowns. )

Cheesy Cauliflower Cakes

Even if you don’t like cauliflower, you’ve got to try these. Pretend they’re hashbrowns if it helps. It worked for us!

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