Hear-ye, hear –ye! I do, on this day, publicly proclaim that we are no longer shackled to basil-centric pesto sauces! We are free to incorporate an infinite arrangement of ingredients in order to incite culinary inspiration! We are no longer fettered to the…huh? What's that? Oh, you already knew this? You say you saw it in my Pumpkin Soup episode, where I topped my soup off with a bit of non-basil pesto? O.K. well, here’s a variation, smart ass.
As usual, it’s stuff I have in my fridge that I need to use up, and all measurements are approximate:
½ cup baby spinach (packed tight)
½ cup arugula (packed tight)
1 cup extra virgin olive oil
½ cup cashews
1 clove garlic
2 tbsp fake parmesan
some cherry tomatoes (halved)
your pasta of chioce
salt/pepper to taste
Super easy, this one. While the pasta’s cooking (I used rice spaghetti), add everything except the oil and tomatoes to your food processor/blender. Pulse it a couple times to start blending it together. Begin to slowly add the oil and ramp it up to full puree mode. When you have that pesto-ish consistency, stop adding the oil (you may not need it all, or you may need more…”half-assed recipe,” remember?).
When the pasta’s done cooking, drain it, give it a shake, and put it right into a mixing bowl while it’s still hot. Toss in a couple spoonfuls of the pesto, some cashew pieces and the fresh tomatoes. Combine it all, gently, and serve it up.
Oh, and the fake parmesan: just blend equal parts nutritional yeast, and almonds, and some salt to taste in the food processor. I usually do a cup of each and keep it on hand at all times. Got that one from this guy. His videos are in German, but he has an English section on his site. Seems like a cool dude.
Anyway, what you should learn here is that there are endless combos of greens, herbs, seeds, and nuts that you can use for your pesto sauce. Here are the general rules, in an easy to remember poem format:
"Something green,
Something olive oil,
Something garlic,
And something nut,
Makes you something very…oh and fake parmesan too…
you can’t forget…um…thut."
yeah.
Posts
