Asparagus, Tomato & Avocado Salad

HOWDY my friends...I hope that everyone enjoyed a blessed Easter weekend.  Our weekend was wonderfully busy hosting our annual family reunion BBQ bash (204 in attendance this year!), but Easter Sunday was much more laid back and relaxed as a much smaller group of us attended church and had lunch together to celebrate the resurrection of our precious Lord Jesus!  Then hubby & I enjoyed a nice, S-L-O-W, afternoon watching old movies, and being determined to put off any major party follow-up tasks (cleaning the house and putting away all the stuff, etc.) until later in the week.

It was a very refreshing, uplifting weekend for me, filled with fun, food, family & friends AND a glorious celebration of the resurrection!  Thanks God...I needed that!

Anyway...now that I'm getting back to "real life", I thought I'd share an incredibly yummy recipe I found over on my friend Kathleen's blog last week.  Asparagus and avocado sounded like an interesting combination, so I just had to try it out.  It was so yummy, my hubby didn't even get much (just his initial serving. and he really liked it too), as I promptly cleaned out the entire bowl!  And yes, I even licked out all the good stuff at the end! 

We were busy with our Easter party preparations, so we didn't have a lot of time to spend in the kitchen last week.  This recipe was really quick & easy, so it fit the bill perfectly.  I served it with some simple pan-seared pork chops (just plain pork chops seasoned with little seasoned salt).  YUM!  Kathleen served hers with some broiled salmon, which sounds good too.  I also think it would go well with just about any grilled or broiled meat...or just by itself.

Asparagus, Tomato & Avocado Salad

For salad:
1 bunch of fresh asparagus (I prefer to use the small stemmed asparagus)
1 pint of cherry (or grape) tomatoes (halved)
1 Haas avocado, ripe (I think I used 2 small avocados)
Mexican crumbling cheese - optional (I added this, and we really liked it.  I think Feta cheese would be good too.  Heck, if you really want to go crazy, some crumbled bacon would probably be delish!)

 
For dressing:
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 Tbsp whole grain mustard
juice of one medium lemon
kosher salt, fresh cracked pepper & granulated garlic to taste (I added the garlic, 'cause I LOVE garlic...feel free to leave it out if you don't.)

Whisk together dressing ingredients, and let stand to allow the flavors to develop while you assemble the salad.

Trim or snap the tough stem ends of asparagus and discard.  Cut the spears into bite-sized pieces.  In a large skillet (with a lid), bring enough water to cover bottom bottom of pan and a pinch of salt to a boil.  Add asparagus, cover and boil for three minutes.  Quickly remove from heat and rinse in cold water to STOP cooking, and keep it crisp.  Drain well.

Cube avocado, and toss with the asparagus and tomatoes in a large bowl. 

Pour dressing over salad and serve.  (NOTE:  I did NOT use all the dressing...just enough to flavor it all, not drown it.  :-)  The leftover dressing is delicious on a regular green salad, or a tomato/cucumber salad too.  I'm going to have to keep that as a separate recipe for future use as well.)

We'll DEFINITELY be having this again...soon!  Be sure to give it a try, I can't recommend it highly enough.

As a side note, I'm a huge fan of avocados...they taste good, AND they're very nutritious.  I came across this website with all kinds of interesting information about avocados, and tons of recipes.  Can't wait to try some of them.

Okay...enough rambling for today.  TRY THIS RECIPE!!!  (Did I already say that?!)  Then let me know what you think.  And don't forget to stop by and say hello to Kathleen, and thank her for passing it along! 

Blessings,
--Faithy