PESTO

                                                     PESTO

 

I love eating pesto by the spoonful. Its so fresh and green and peppery! I love how the flavours of basil, pine nuts, garlic, parmesan and olive oil, play together in your palate so beautifully ! 

And you can do so much with it! Other than eating it by the spoonful, I mean.  Toss it with pasta, use it as a pizza topping, use in your  salad or spread it in your sandwich ! 

Originally the Italian pesto was made using basil, pine nut, garlic, parmesan and olive oil with the help of  a mortar and pestle. But now it's a 2 min job in the blender.

And moreover, modern pestos are made using many different combinations of nuts and greens. Once you know the basic recipe, It's just a matter of swapping 1 or2 ingredients . 

You can make it fine or keep it chunky. Personally I like it a bit chunky. The chunky bits cling so well to pasta, i feel.

Store it in an airtight container . Make sure there is at least a thin layer of oil on top. ( prevents it from going bad)

Some of the greens that you can try making pesto with are coriander, parsley, rocket, spinach etc, etc.....

Maybe even tender peas...

And for the nuts you could choose from walnuts, almonds, pistachios, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds, peanuts...

Even the cheese doesn't have to be just parmesan. You could try some combination of cheeses that you have on hand. Many times I use simple processed cheese. Tastes perfectly fine to me.

If you don't particularly care for the grassy overtones of olive oil, use canola or ant other flavourless one. Feel free.

And lastly the Garlic ! Do not substitute . Some things are best left to tradition !

Have fun!

Ingredients

1/4th cup toasted pine nuts
1/4th cup toasted walnuts
6-9 cloves of garlic
1/2 – 1 tsp coarse sea salt
4 cups basil, washed and dried
1 cup Parmesan cheese, freshly grated
1- 1 1/2 cup olive oil

Method

1. In a food processor, grind the walnut, pine nuts and garlic to a paste. Add the salt.
2. Add the basil leaves and maybe a tiny little bit of oil or water for it to come together.
3. Add the parmesan cheese.
4. Now through the feed tube, pour in the oils until evenly blended.
5. Transfer to a jar and serve and use as you like!