Tag Archives: pesto

Quarantine pesto : arugula and peanuts

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Pesto is a delicious and extremely quarantine friendly sauce – no basil? But you have that arugula from 2 weeks ago- half of it is just fine, oh here is some parsley too. No pine nuts? Well- I found a jar of cocktail peanuts. No pecorino? That pre-grated Parmesan will work. It’s the sharpness of the garlic with copious amounts of olive oil that is the main flavor of this sauce- anything green and anything nutty and anything cheesy will work

In a food processor – add 4 cups of greens (I added 3 cups arugula and 1 cup parsley), add 1/2-3/4 cup nuts (I used cocktail peanuts), 2-5 cloves of garlic (I like the spice of raw garlic) . Whiz till smooth. Add a cupful or so of grated Parmesan and a half cup or so of good olive oil and salt. Taste and use

I plan to toss this pesto with some pasta for dinner and roasted potatoes for crunch and perhaps some fried up veggie dogs for protein

Handkerchief pasta with pesto

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Nebraska has a 2-3 month growing season and when the basil grows high- it is time to make pesto! I  like a mixture of basil and parsley in my pesto- I like the “greener” taste that parsley gives to the pesto.

Nothing goes better with pesto than fresh pasta. Today we made handkerchief pasta (Fazzoletti) -simple,silky and delicious. It is essentially ravioli sheets cut into squares. My pasta machine makes this very very  easy but here Mark Bittman shows how you can use a rolling pin to achieve the same effect (https://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/12/dining/12mini.html)

Pesto: 2 cups basil leaves, 1 cup parsley leaves, 1/2 cup toasted pine nuts, 1 clove garlic, 1/2 cup Parmesan reggiano, 1/2 cup olive oil: Use food processor to make a fine paste. Stores in the refrigerator for 3-4 days

Pasta: 2 cups all purpose flour, 2 eggs, 3 egg yolks, 1 tsp salt. Make a fairly dry dough using the absolute minimum amount of water needed ( I used 2 tbsp today). It takes me 4-5 minutes using my kitchen aid stand mixer

Rolling pasta: I used the pasta attachment to my kitchen aid. Start on the first setting- run the dough through thrice (folding into an envelope each time). Decrease the setting by 1 in each subsequent run all the way to the thinnest setting (8). Use flour liberally to prevent the pasta sticking. Cut into large 4 inch squares. Cook in salted boiling water for 3 minutes or so (add the squares one at a time- they tend to stick)

Thin pesto with pasta cooking water, toss with pasta and enjoy the taste of spring.