Summer Cooking: Pesto

Our garden is bonkers this year. I have more tomatoes, cucumbers and basil than I can possibly use. In an attempt to make the most out of all of this fresh produce, I made a batch of pesto sauce the other day. No surprise, I turned to Ina Garten for the recipe. Also no surprise, it’s delicious. I’ll link here and post below: https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/pesto-recipe2-1948775

Pesto Recipe

Ingredients

1/4 cup walnuts

1/4 cup pignolis (pine nuts)

3 tablespoons chopped garlic (9 cloves)*

5 cups fresh basil leaves, packed

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 1/2 cups good olive oil

1 cup freshly grated Parmesan

Directions

Place the walnuts, pignolis, and garlic in the bowl of a food processor fitted with a steel blade. Process for 30 seconds. Add the basil leaves, salt, and pepper. With the processor running, slowly pour the olive oil into the bowl through the feed tube and process until the pesto is thoroughly pureed. Add the Parmesan and puree for a minute. Serve, or store the pesto in the refrigerator or freezer with a thin film of olive oil on top.

*I only used seven cloves of garlic and that is plenty for me.

Basil

Pesto process from start to finish…I even grated my own cheese!

I somehow didn’t get a photo of the pesto on my tortellini, but it was delicious. And easy to make! The following day Ben made a big batch of tomato basil sauce. He didn’t really follow a recipe (Roma tomatoes, basil, butter, salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, oregano and olive oil), but it’s fabulous.