Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Basil Pesto


With the weather turning cooler, I recently picked all my basil and turned it into pesto for the winter. It turns out that I only had about 8 cups worth of basil, which translated to about a cup and a half of pesto.

Next year I'll start making the pesto earlier, before my basil starts going to seed.


I follow a pretty basic recipe for my pesto, with pine nuts being my nut of choice. Sadly the pine nuts are around $18 a pound, so walnuts might be a better choice. I googled "why are pine nuts so dang expensive," and I learned that it's because they are a very labor intensive nut to produce. It takes a lot of time to separate the nuts from the pine cone. That, and demand for them has increased, so the price has too.

Somehow it doesn't make me feel better about buying them, so I think I'll use walnuts next time.


I couldn't find my back up ice cube trays, so I used this pan intended for brownies. It worked out great and left me with cute little 2 T pesto hearts. How cute is that?


This is the recipe I use. It's not difficult at all, and so worth it. I put the pesto on pasta, fish, and even as a spread for sandwiches. Yummy!

Don't forget to click on the recipe for the best resolution before saving it to your computer. Enjoy!

8 comments:

  1. I love pesto and your looks yummy! Pine nuts cost a fortune in the UK too. I use cashews in mine when Im trying to reduce costs and its lovely! Love your little tray! x

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  2. I just saw an awesome pasta recipe with pesto from Mario Batali on the new show The Chew. http://beta.abc.go.com/shows/the-chew/recipes/Mario-Batali-Linguine-Genovese

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  3. ugh, nuts are expensive! It is $20/lb for pecans, and I love pecans in my salads, etc. and it drives me nuts that it is so expensive, other nuts too!! why are healthy food so expensive?? maybe the general world population wouldn't be overweight if the junk food was expensive while the healthy food was more affordable.

    Anyway, I totally pinned this recipe for future use. Next year ( i say that every year) I will have a garden of my own!

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  4. haha I just realized I said it drives me nuts that nuts are expensive haha how ironic!

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  5. I love pesto but yeah - those pine nuts are pricey! I use sunflower seeds in my recipe (which is here if you want to check it out: http://puresugar.net/?p=3219). The heart shapes are so cute!

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  6. You have been pinned! Will be doing this once my blender gets repaired. I cracked the blade last night while making homemade laundry detergent. Darn bar of soap was too chunky!

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  7. I use walnuts in mine and it always comes out fantastic

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