papa’s midnight pesto

A few weeks ago, I broke out my favorite cooking reference book, The New Best Recipe Cookbook, to see what they had to say about making pesto. As always, they offered lots of little extra touches like bruising the basil leaves, toasting the nuts and pan roasting the garlic, for extra layers of flavor. 

 

 

The pesto I made using their recipe was good but way too salty. I halved their recipe and I’m not sure if there was a mistake in the recipe or if my basic math failed me (I’m going to go out on a limb and guess it was the latter) but the pesto I created was so salty it was almost inedible.

 

So I did what I could. I added all kinds of other stuff like steamed kale and chard, lemon juice and more oil in an attempt to cut the salt.

 

It worked pretty well and we’ve been enjoying pesto on pasta, pizza, bread, crackers – really just about anything and everything.

 

So this past week when we picked up our CSA share, which often includes a “take what you can use” helping of basil, I took a sizeable handful, with the intentions of giving my new pesto recipe another go.

 

But then it got hot…really hot…and I wanted to be just about anywhere but in our kitchen, so Saturday afternoon I put the leaves to soak in a bath of water in the sink promising myself I would return to them later that night.

 

Who knows what happened (lately it seems any number of things can throw off the best laid plans around here) but day slipped into evening and evening into night and next thing I knew it was close to midnight when John and I finished watching a movie (Adventureland – very cute movie) and I remembered the soaking basil leaves.

 

John, who is much more of a night owl than I am, offered to make the pesto. 

 

As I puttered about the house tidying up, he got to work.

 

After a few minutes I wandered into the kitchen.

 

“I read in The New Best Recipe that you should bruise the leaves first…”

 

“Uh-huh.”

 

“You can also toast the nuts for more flavor…”

 

“Right.”

 

“And if you wanted to, you could pan roast the garlic – that really seems to make a difference…”

 

It was midnight and still close to 90 degrees in our kitchen.

 

My beloved looked up at me and without saying a word conveyed that I was welcome to either make the pesto myself or get out of the kitchen and let him do it his way.

 

I opted to head up to bed and let him do his work in peace.

 

Two days later, we ate dinner huddled around our makeshift coffee table (ahem…a plastic Rubbermaid tub) in our basement (you do what you gotta do to keep cool in August ;-).

 

As we licked every last drop of Papa’s pesto off our forks, it was decided that we can forget the fancy recipes with all their roasting, toasting and bruising – Papa’s Midnight Pesto works for us!

 

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Papa’s Midnight Pesto

(a use-what you have, taste-as-you go, recipe)

 

A couple of handfuls of basil leaves (washed, stems removed)

A few pinches of salt

A dash of pepper

Garlic (one clove per handful of basil – or to taste)

A few tablespoons of pine nuts or walnuts (we usually use walnuts, which are cheaper and full of nutrients)

Splash of lemon juice

Olive oil (enough to get a smooth consistency)

*Grated Cheese (we add the cheese in when we serve the pesto, not when we make it)

 

Start by blending everything except the olive oil in a food processor.

 

Slowly add the olive oil and process until you get a smooth and spreadable consistency.

 

Sample the pesto. Add more salt or garlic as needed. Use lemon juice to cut the garlic if it is too strong.

 

Store in the fridge for a few days or freeze to store for several months. Add freshly grated cheese to taste when you serve.