I hate photography.
Well, really, I just hate taking photos. I wish I could just snap my fingers and get the image in my head onto my computer. Instantly. I'm putting that on my queue of inventions to invent if I was an inventor.
In fact, I've been thinking (only half tongue in cheek) about blogging a plea for a garden photographer to come work their magic in my garden. (Oh, and I know several who don't fool me for one bit that they aren't lurking here.)
What does this have to do with pesto?
Unfortunately, photographers, the only green I am rolling in right now is basil.
Hit me up if you want to be paid in pesto.
I've got basil plants well into the double digits, so I have been making Poor Man's Pesto left and right. I call it that because have you seen the price of pine nuts recently? For a little bitty jar? How about olive oil? I don't have panic attacks, but shopping for pesto ingredients had me close.
Poor Man's Pesto
(an inaccurate recipe rendition)
Ingredients:
-wad of fresh basil
-garlic
-olive oil
-parmesan
-water
-salt
1. Pour a half cup-ish of water into your blender. (This is where a food processor would come in handy! I have to get liquid in my blender first or else the basil just sits at the bottom and taunts me)
2. Start shoving basil by the handfuls down into the water.
3. Add a few spoonfuls of garlic, a hefty shake or two of parmesan and some salt. Drizzle a generous amount of olive oil on top and blend.
4. It's usually fairly runny at this point, so I just add in more basil until it gets to the consistency I like. Taste and add more garlic/salt as necessary. Sometimes I add more olive oil too. Really, do whatever you want here. (Except for adding ketchup)
Kinda looks like baby goop, but it's fresh and oh-so-tasty! I spoon it into the small freezer containers and pop it on the pesto shelf in the freezer. Oh yes, there is so much basil I do indeed have a pesto shelf.
Since it has way less olive oil than your normal pesto, and no pine nuts, we usually use Poor Man's Pesto for cooking. It's great as a sauce on pizza or mixed up with noodles.
I'm off to change my voicemail now since I expect the photographer phone calls to start rolling in.
What's your favorite way to eat pesto-pesto-pesto?
yum, pine nuts are expensive, I've substituted with cashews they taste good too. Can't wait to have Basil again, first bits of coriander here.
ReplyDeleteI use toasted walnuts lots of times instead of pinenuts. Works just as well. I put the pesto in ice cube trays, freeze it, then pop them out into freezer baggies, so I can grab a cube of pesto to add to pasta or soups. I agree with you on the photography -- wish it could be easier. I actually had a newspaper photographer here today taking pics and I was amazed at all of the equipment. I am so NOT there. My little point and click will have to do.
ReplyDeleteWhen I make pesto in a blender I always start out with the oil before the basil. That way you don't have use water.
ReplyDeleteAnd walnuts, hazel nuts or sunflower seeds can be good substitutes for the pine nuts. It's not the "real" pesto genoese, but it's good.
(And you can do this with other herbs than basil... Parsley pesto with hazel nuts is rather nice, I find.)
I've used other nuts as substitutes too. I love pesto. I haven't managed to grow basil very well in the last couple of years though. What's your secret?
ReplyDeleteGreat recipe! I make lots of pesto, and I always add some type of nut. This recipe must give it more basil flavor. I can't wait to try it. I like pesto with pasta and in marinara sauces.
ReplyDelete@veggiegobbler: Haha, there is no secret! I pinch it back fairly hard. Or should I say, I let the Tornado harvest it, and she just yanks handfuls off. I make sure to always pinch off the flowers when they start to form, too.
ReplyDeleteWe don't particularly care for nuts period, but I might try some pesto with some other kind of nut to use as a gift!
I agree, pine nuts are prohibitively expensive. As such we now frequently use walnut pieces instead in our Pesto...which reminds me, I have small basil forest begging to chopped down at the moment! ;) The walnuts are great though, and give that little bit of nutty texture, but without burning a hole in your wallet! I've made nutless pestos too though, and you're right, for pizza, or spreading on sandwiches, it's just fine!
ReplyDeleteThis is brilliant, I've made some too, random pine nuts bought five billion years ago lobbed in, of course, then I read yours and thought, rats, could have saved the fossil pine nuts......
ReplyDeleteI hope you don't mind I've linked my september pesto post comments with your blog, to show them how it's really done :)
Brilliant!
Try subbing walnuts for the pine nuts... a bit less expensive but still divine!
ReplyDeleteI hate photography too. Last week I took 9 gorgeous pics in my garden and then managed to delete them all by the time I got back to the house! At least with film, once you'd taken them they stayed on the film ... my fault for being technically challenged! Love Pesto (with or without pine nuts)! Have never been successful growing Basil tho so will try again!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteI've managed to grow half a dozen pesto, I mean basil, plants this year and that was good going - ah well! I wonder what pesto would be like with walnuts in? I might try it, with my tiny crop...
ReplyDelete