Adapted from Make It Easy in Your Kitchen by Laurie Burrows Grad (HP Books, 1989)
I’m not in love with pesto on pasta.
In Italy, pesto is often tossed with pasta, potatoes, and green beans so everything melds. But even that doesn’t really do it for me. And yet—every summer, basil reappears. It smells so good. It sounds like something I should want to make. So every year, I find myself trying again.
What I like best is to stir a spoonful into soup—especially Marcella’s minestrone, served at room temperature in summer. Or into rice pilaf. It’s a nice condiment to have on hand, to use sparingly.
That’s why I keep a recipe for it.
And for what it’s worth, Paula Wolfert, in Mediterranean Cooking (Alfred A. Knopf, 1977), adds a touch of light cream to her pesto, as they do in Nervi, south of Genoa. That always sounded like cheating to me. But then again, so does adding cream to carbonara or aioli—and it sometimes makes things better. So you decide.
Pesto
1 cup tightly packed fresh basil leaves, stems removed, washed, and dried
½ cup best-quality extra-virgin olive oil
3 tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan (or a mix of Parmesan and Pecorino Romano, if you like it sharper)
2 tablespoons pine nuts
3 small garlic cloves, peeled
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
½ teaspoon salt, or to taste (the cheese adds saltiness)
¼ teaspoon white pepper (the original recipe calls for white—I use it, but black would be fine too)
Place everything in the bowl of a food processor and process—pulsing on and off—until smooth and fully blended.
If not using right away, store with a thin film of olive oil on top to prevent discoloration and refrigerate.
To freeze, leave out the cheese and add it after thawing.
Hello -- this isn't a comment on this post, specifically, but one relative to your April 101 Cookbooks statement, which I just came across, where you responded to the fellow who was new to the kitchen and somewhat at sea. I thought you responded very graciously, and with good information.
ReplyDeleteI'd have put this in an email, but I didn't see one on your site (g).
Victoria- To really get the basil leaves' flavorful oils released, it helps to mash the leaves beforehand, easiest with a rolling pin or something in a ziplock bag, then putting the basil into the food processor. This more accurately creates the authentic taste and process in italy where the ingredients are mashed into a "paste" (pesto) with a mortar and pestle thereby releasing the oils, rather than just chopping the leaves as a food processor does.
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