Tomorrow is shopping day. My cupboards are very bare. We want a light supper and neither of us is in the mood for meat. We had the old stand-by pasta yesterday. What to do?
I have a quarter of an almost-shriveled yellow pepper in the fridge. At the cost of these things, its a crime to let one turn to slime.
I also have half of a fennel bulb left from a previous recipe.
In the freezer are some left over asparagus spears, already steamed.
In the pantry are a can of cannellini beans and a can of diced tomatoes.
And, no matter how bare the larder, there is always garlic, spices, and good olive oil.
So...I assembled this dubious array of ingredients on the counter while my husband looked on with raised eyebrow and the phonebook turned to the carryout pizza pages.
I rinsed and drained the beans
Chopped the fennel coursely
Diced the yellow pepper
Cut six asparagus spears into pieces and saved six whole ones for garnish.
In a heavy skillet I softened the fennel, garlic, and yellow pepper in olive oil with a generous sprinkle of dried basil and a dash of red pepper flakes.
When the fennel was soft, I added the beans and cut asparagus and kind of seared them until they were hot.
Then I added half of the can of diced tomatoes without draining.
Let it heat through.
Drizzled the top with olive oil and tossed before plating, topping with the whole asparagus spears.
For a make-do meal it was delicious.
I'd love to hear from the REAL cooks on this board, what they would do to this recipe to make it something one would want to make on purpose next time.

Deborah,
Your dish is beautiful and you certainly are a REAL cook - you prove it with your ability to garnish! As for doing anything different, it sounds like you don't need to improve it - though next time you probably won't have to use "an almost shriveled yellow pepper" - and if you absolutely want to do more work, you can start with dried beans and fresh asparagus (maybe roasting them in the oven). Fresh basil would be a nice touch, too.

-Krista

Thanks, Krista. I would start with fresh beans and asparagus, for sure. Also, I think it would have been better if I had had a fresh tomato to use instead of canned. The roasting sounds like a good idea, too.
I also think I used too much garlic. It is easy to overpower the flavor of the beans and fennel if you are too heavyhanded with the garlic.

Deborah,
IMHO a real cook understands ingredients and how to combine them to a meal (rather than just following a recipe). I like this definition because it includes me. Obviously, it also includes you.
Can you roast already steamed asparagus? Probably not.
Do you have a kitchen garden? We have fresh basil in ours. Yahoo gives me the St Louis weather as 6c-20c today, so I wonder if you can still grow anything in midwinter.

John, You just touched on one of the very, very few reasons for NOT living in St. Louis. No year-round basil.
As a basil addict, it does frustrate me. However, I did solve the problem this year. I bought a grow light. Now I have a little table with a couple of long planters sitting on it and a grow light suspended in the middle. I can have fresh, tender green basil year round.
I've never tried roasting a frozen veggie. I also doubt it would work.

In Ireland the shops sell potted herbs that you can keep on a windowsill or over a radiator - they won't survive the winter but do make for a ready supply of fresh leaves in the dark months.