Pesto recipes??

Epicurean Exploits - Food and Recipes
1

What are your favorites? If I like them I’ll submit them under my name for the WB Recipe Book. [wink.gif]

Mark

2

Be careful with the Pine Nuts you purchase. Find out where they are from. If you get ones from China they can cause temporary damage to your taste buds and make a lots things taste bitter. There is some info at Wikipedia.

3

Recipe? What recipe? EVOO, basil, garlic, hard cheese like Romano, a little salt, and pine nuts. What’s important is the ingredients. Use the absolute best you can get for each ingredient. Proportions are really to your personal taste. Like John says, be very careful with the pine nuts. Better to leave them out than use ones that aren’t really fresh and tasty.

You could use a mortar and pestle, but I find a food processor works just fine (and much easier!)

Use very good pasta. I like it with whole wheat pasta. In Genoa, they use a mix of pasta and potatoes. I’m not a big fan of the potatoes.

4

Marcella’s pesto. Basil, olive oil, garlic, pine nuts, parmigiano, salt, and butter.

5

Fresh pesto is so great. How can one improve on it?
When I make rack of lamb, I put a bit of mint into my mix. Wow.

6

If you can’t find good quality pine nuts, walnuts make a great substitute.

7

Arugula, Toasted Hazelnuts, EVOO, Parm, Salt & Pepper.

Try it, you’ll love the result.

8

Cranked out the first batch yesterday.

4 cups (packed) whole fresh basil leaves
5 cloves garlic peeled
1/4 cup pine nuts
5 oz. EVO
2 cups (freshly grated so it was very loose in terms of density) reggiano parm

Load ingredients 1-4 into the hopper of the Cuisinart and pulse 'til roughly pureed.
Add the cheese and spin some more until it’s incorporated. Check for seasoning.
I tend to leave it a little on the under salted side because like almost all of my pasta procedures, I add the salted cooking water back into the sauce.

I started adding toasted pepitas as a garnish to my linguine with pesto a little while back. It makes for an interesting combination of flavors and textures.

9

Marcella Hazan says to leave the cheese out if you’re going to freeze it. Add the cheese when you thaw. Just a tidbit.

10

My GF found a recipe for kale and walnut pesto. Same basic concept as regular: blanch the kale for a several minutes and blend with toasted walnuts, oil and cheese. I highly recommend it.

11

I’ll be making and freezing this weekend. Thanks for the ideas. Next weekend it is the start of harvest for our Harralson apple tree.

12

I like to freeze Thomas Keller’s basil puree. Basically blanch 10 seconds the basil, chill in ice water, then dry. Add a little bit of garlic, good olive oil, puree and you are done. The blanching keeps the color bright and the lack of nuts, cheese means it freezes better and you can add what you want at the time you need it (pine nuts, walnuts, parsley, arugula, parmesan, etc.).

13

I cannot find any pine nuts that ARE NOT from China. Would using pine nuts from the “all natural” section of my grocery store work?

14

Everyone says “good EVOO” but come on now, not all EVOOs are the same either. Some are bold, some are mellow, some are herbal while others fruity. I’m hoping to explore with identical ingredients, but different EVOOs (Dorandi, Trapetti, Colavita, etc) to see which I prefer and what impact each has on the final product, all other ingredients being the same.

Do people have EVOOs they use specifically for pesto? If so which ones, and WHY?

15

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16

ooops.
Guess I woke up with a Woody…

[rofl.gif] [rofl.gif] [rofl.gif]