Tonight's Dinner

I'm making one of my favorite quick recipes for dinner tonight, creamy goat cheese pasta with roasted asparagus. This is another recipe from Martha Stewart's Everyday Food magazine and tv program.

I use olive oil or a spread such as Smart Balance instead of butter. I wouldn't use the Smart Balance with flax oil though because it can't stand up to the heat. Sometimes I'll add a tablespoon or two of dijon mustard which adds a nice flavor.

Serves 4 Prep time: 20 minutes Total time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:

2 bunches asparagus (2 pounds total), tough ends removed
4 tablespoons butter, cut into small pieces
12 ounces cavatappi or other short pasta
1 small log soft goat cheese (5 ounces), crumbled
2 to 3 tablespoons snipped fresh chives, for garnish

Here's what to do:

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Bring a large pot of water to a boil for pasta. Place asparagus on a large rimmed baking sheet; dot with 1 tablespoon butter, and season with salt and pepper. Roast until tender, tossing occasionally, 10 to 15 minutes; cut into 2-inch lengths.

While asparagus is roasting, generously salt boiling water. Add pasta, and cook until al dente, according to package instructions. Set aside 1 1/2 cups pasta water; drain pasta and return to pot.

In a medium bowl, combine goat cheese, remaining 3 tablespoons butter, and 1/2 cup pasta water. Season with salt and pepper, and whisk until smooth. Add goat-cheese mixture and asparagus to pasta; toss to combine, adding more pasta water if necessary for sauce to coat pasta. Serve pasta garnished with chives.

Yum.

New Coke Commercial for the Olympics

I unapologetically love the Olympics. I love the opening ceremonies, the human interest stories, the triumphs, the daily medal counts and the countless events.

And I've always loved Coke's Olympics commercials. They didn't disappoint me these games. This ad with Yao Ming and Lebron James is very clever: the display of each country's culture, the playful competitiveness and the cool music. Good job.

Quote for the Day

Since we dodged another tropical storm bullet yesterday and today I thought this would be a good quote for the day.

What sky! What light! Ah in spite of all it is blessed thing to be alive in such weather...
—Samuel Beckett

More Tysabri problems

Tysabri is a fairly new MS treatment and differs from the other treatments in that it is a monthly infusion rather than a self-adminstered injection. Tysabri was fast-tracked by the FDA because the clinical trial results were incredible. Tysabri became available in 2004 and was pulled in March 2005 because of three deaths due to PML, progressive multifocal leukoencephalitis.

The way Tysabri works is that it makes the blood-brain barrier sticky so that the confused and rogue white blood cells are unable to cross the barrier to damage myelin in the brain, spinal cord and optic nerve. While this is remarkable there is danger that the central nervous system is somewhat vulnerable to infection, such as PML, because those same rogue fighter cells are unable to get to the infection to help fight it. And this my friends, is very dangerous.

After further review by the FDA Tysabri returned to market in July 2006 and it's been adminstered without incident until late yesterday when news broke after the US markets closed that two additional cases of PML have been diagnosed. One patient is at home and the other is in the hospital. I couldn't find any additional information about their current condition. I hope they recover quickly and completely.

Investors are skittish about the news and the stock has taken a beating this morning. This shouldn't be reason to pull Tysabri again but it should underscore the risk involved with powerful drugs.