Pesto

Pesto waiting for it's carby friend,
dipping bread.

You know what I love about Italian restaurants? They aren't afraid of carbs. The vast majority of Italian restaurants that you go into will serve you some sort of bread before your meal arrives. One of my favorite Italian places to go that does this is Parmesans in Frankfort. It's on Route 30, which is a little torn up right now, but it is worth going there. I love this place. They will bring you out these lovely dough knots with a cup of pesto sauce for dipping. It is sooooo good. Lick the container good. I want it right now just thinking about it good and it is just what I thought of last week at the farmer's market when I bought a big bag of basil.

Basil is delicious. Period. It smells wonderful and it tastes wonderful too. It's strong, but don't be intimidated because it makes great things, like pesto. So yes, I was inspired in the train station parking lot last Saturday to make pesto. Since I have never made this elusive pesto before, where did I go for inspiration? You got it, Google, my answer to everything.

I Googled it and looked a couple of different recipes for pesto. They were generally the same, variances on amounts of ingredients, some offered a few tips, so I wrote down what I thought sounded good and went from there.

Here is what I did:
2 cups of fresh basil, washed, leaves only, NO STEMS.
1/2 cup of extra virgin olive oil (but you will add more at the end)
5 cloves of garlic, sounds like a lot and it is, but I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE garlic. Cooking is about the adventure and personal tastes. Feel free to personalize it for your likes!
2 Tbs walnuts
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 Tbs of lemon juice
1tsp sugar

Basil ready to become pesto.

In my food processor, I minced up the nuts first. I decided to do this because I didn't want the basil to become a mushy pulp if I added it first and then had to chop everything else in there too. Ok, chopped nuts add the garlic cloves and give another little chop. I used pulse on the processor so I could go slowly. Then I added in the basil. Pulse, pulse, pulse until the basil is finely chopped up. Don't over do it. You don't want sludge. Now, add in the olive oil, salt, Parmesan cheese, lemon juice and sugar. Pulse some more until it is all incorporated and mixed well.

Now transfer it to a container that you can seal and add olive oil until the pesto is at the consistency you like it at. This is a preference thing. That's it. You're done.

Now I store it in the fridge, but be sure to take it out before serving because the olive oil will harden in the cold and will need time to "thaw" out some.

Serve it with bread to dip. I brought this to a party on a tray with sliced salami, slice provolone and bread to dip. It was delicious and looked great too. Give it a try for an out of the ordinary appetizer. You will be pleasantly surprised.