Pesto Tips and Recipes

Recipes

Posted by Alaina Browne, May 18, 2007 at 1:36 PM

The lovingly illustrated food blog Lobstersquad's list of tips for preparing and storing pesto inspired me to hunt down a few pesto recipes.

Gourmet's recipe is pretty typical and easy to make, but if you have more time and patience it is probably worth following Heidi's suggestion and making pesto like an Italian grandma -- chop chop chop and chop some more!

We like Tom Colicchio's straight-forward approach to green things, and have adapted his recipe below. This one's all about the basil.

Pesto
- makes 1 cup -

Ingredients
Leaves from 1 large bunch basil

3 cloves garlic

1 cup extra virgin olive oil

3 ounces Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, grated

Salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Fresh lemon juice

Pine nuts, toasted or sautéed (optional)

Procedure
1. Place abut 4 cups ice cubes in large bowl; 2 quarts cold water. Put a large colander in bowl so it fills with ice water.

2. In a saucepan, boil 3 quarts water. Add garlic to water; cook for 30 seconds. Remove garlic with a slotted spoon. Add the basil; cook 15 seconds. Remove basil with a skimmer; place in ice water, and cool about 1 minute. Drain well, and squeeze excess water out of basil leaves.

3. Add basil and garlic to a food processor; chop. Transfer to a blender; blend on high while adding olive oil in a thin stream while the machine is blending. Add the Parmigiano; process until blended. Season to taste with salt, pepper, and lemon juice, processing briefly to mix.

4. Add pine nuts, whole, to whatever dish you're using the pesto with.

5 Comments | Tags: basil, pesto

5 Comments:

I made my first pesto last week from home grown basil. I didn't have quite enough basil and used a load of pine nuts but it actually turned out great. I seared some scallops, stirfried some mushrooms, and mixed it together with pasta. Very tasty, at least coming from my kitchen!

NSW at 1:42PM on 05/18/07

I don't know about y'all but I always end up with lots of leftover pesto that I never quite know what to do with. This list is helpful in taking full advantage of the pesto experience.
http://madisonandmayberry.typepad.com/madison_mayberry/2006/09/pesto_pesto_pes.html

alynn at 2:14PM on 05/18/07

I don't want to seem rude or anything, but WHAT????? Why do you blanch garlic and basil??????? It's against any REAL Italian rule to make pesto!!!!
And I think I can say that because I'm Italian, I live in Italy, I grow basil on my balcony, and I enjoy pesto all the time... You loose all the flavor if you blanch basil...

The simplest way to make pesto, if you don't want to actually use the traditional way (that doesn't involve any mixer, but just mortar, pestel and good muscle), just blend together all the ingredients stated above (MINUS the lemon juice!!!) and add enough extra-virgin olive oil to obtain a creamy texture... But DO NOT BOIL anything!!!!
I never weight my pesto ingredients: my measurements for pesto are just taste and look, and maybe three garlic cloves seems a bit too much, but that's just taste...

DO NOT BOIL, please!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sara - Piperita at 2:43PM on 05/18/07

I'm glad I've inspired a lively discussion, and I promise not to boil my basil when making pesto! :) Blanching the basil shouldn't significantly alter its taste -- only in the hot water 15 seconds and then straight the ice water to make sure it doesn't cook but it certainly does enhance its basil green.

Alaina Browne at 2:58PM on 05/18/07

Blanching might bring out some bitterness in the basil, I would think. As for the garlic... I don't know, would that cut down on its sharpness? Neither seems very necessary.

I've used sunflower seeds as stand-ins for pine nuts in a pinch. It's a slightly less creamy taste, but not too far off.

me3dia at 5:47PM on 05/21/07

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