Looking for a pesto recipe? or how to make pesto? Watch our Pesto Recipe with a new twist, we'll use parsley instead of basil. This same recipe works great for basil pesto BTW. Parsley is super healthy and easily found in the store or your backyard garden.
Eric's Parsley Pesto Recipe
1 bunch of flat leaf parsley
2 cups grated Romano cheese
1 cup walnuts, whole or chopped
1 clove garlic, crushed
quality extra virgin olive oil
Grab your bunch of parsley and swish it around in a large bowl of water or you salad spinner filled up with water.
Cut off about 2 inches of the stem end off the parsley bunch. Then cut the parsley bunch into thirds, drop into a salad spinner and spin away. You want to remove as much of the water as possible. If you don't have a salad spinner, you can roll up the parsley leaves in a dish towel to dry them out.
Add the parsley to your food processor, and pour in about ¼ cup of the olive oil. About 6 glugs, I think.
Turn on the food processor and get the parsley cut up and mixed in with the oil.
Take the walnuts and toss them into a pan and toast them lightly. Don't forget them on the stove, as they burn easily. I know this from experience.
Take the grated cheese and walnuts and crushed garlic and add to the food processor.
Top off with more olive oil, 6 glugs or so, and turn on the processor. If the machine sounds like it is bogging down, add more oil. Process to the consistency you like. I like it not over-processed.
You can now add this to pasta or spread on bread or garnish soups with. Its real good.
What do you think? Do you have a pesto recipe or suggestion or idea? Let us know below:
Tonia Moxley
You can also cover the top of the pesto with olive oil to seal air out. That's very Italian.
Patrick Tegen
Another great variation on the classic basil pesto is to use asparagus instead of basil. Personally I just use the woody ends of the asparagus for it. Simply steam or boil the ends until they are soft enough to puree. Then follow your regular pesto recipe. I love it, and it gives me a new use for the parts of asparagus I usually just compost.
Alisha
I like pesto with some hot pepper flakes or sun dried tomatoes.
Stuccolow
Just made garlic green, beet green, basil, parsley, tahini "pesto". Realized that I forgot the nuts, wall or pine. It was super tasty! Really garlicy in a good way. But I did miss the texture nuts provide.
I cooked the pasta a different way. More like a risotto. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/02/dining/021mrex.html?ref=dining
It took about an ounce of wheat pasta 18 minutes to cook and 2 cups of water. Very fast and I didn't need to use a colander.
Now I need to go breath on some vampires!
Philip
Cool! My mom had so many walnuts, hazelnuts and parsley from the garden this year that she didn't know what to do with them. Ended up improvising pretty much exactly what you made here (except for the cheese). Gave me a few jars as well when I visited and I whipped up some nice dishes with it. Try stirring in some more oil and then adding a blob of it to a bowl of creamy tomato soup, right before serving...