Fabulous pesto!

Clas­sic pesto ingredients

Pesto adds to many dishes. The clas­sic pesto,of course,con­sists of sweet basil,Parme­san cheese,olive oil,pine nuts and gar­lic. Talk about ver­sa­tile! This won­der­ful condi­ment punches up every­thing from omelets to chicken to pasta.

• Add a tea­spoon or so to scram­bled eggs to add fla­vor and nutrients
• Top cooked chicken with a cou­ple of tea­spoons — let sit a few min­utes before serving
• Serve with mini-toasts or baguette pieces as an appetizer
• Cook the pasta of your choice and toss with pesto. Add chicken and toma­toes if you prefer.
• Freeze pesto in old fash­ioned ice cube trays. Store cubes in the freezer bags — each cube serves as a sin­gle por­tion for cook­ing through­out the winter!

This recipe is so easy to make — all you need are the ingre­di­ents,a food proces­sor or blender and some stor­age containers.

Clas­sic Pesto Recipe

2 cups fresh basil leaves

2 table­spoons pine nuts

2 cups grated Parme­san cheese*

3 gar­lic cloves,minced (4 if small)

1/2 cup olive oil

*You can sub­sti­tute Asi­ago or Romano cheese for sharper taste.

Dol­lop of basic pesto

Blend basil leaves in food proces­sor fit­ted with stan­dard blade. Add pine nuts,cheese and gar­lic in the order listed until a thick paste forms. Add olive oil to the proces­sor by driz­zling in steady stream to mix through. Scrape sides as needed. Pesto should be the con­sis­tency of a smooth paste. Cover and keep refrig­er­ated,will last up to five days.

Other vari­a­tions

Pesto can be made in count­less vari­a­tions. Cre­ate your own!

If you pre­fer less cheese,scale back to 1/2 cup of cheese and add more nuts (1/2 cup of nuts com­pared to the pre­vi­ous 2 tablespoons.

Try mak­ing a cilantro pesto with cilantro,pecans,Asi­ago cheese,gar­lic,olive oil and a tea­spoon of lime juice. Use the pro­por­tions & method above. Although she bought the cilantro pesto,my friend Diane recently served cilantro pesto this way:wrap the pesto and salmon with cedar paper soaked in water and grill. (Whole Foods car­ries cedar paper.) Wow! Thanks Diane!

If you use the sharper cheeses like asi­ago or Romano with the basil,pair it with a stronger meat to stand up to the taste:thanks my good friend Carter,here’s a ter­rific steak ver­sion:grill or broil a steak. Top with the Asiago/Parmesan pesto. Place in a warmer or under a broiler just until the pesto starts to bub­ble,then brown on top of the steak. MMM! He sug­gests a stronger wine,like Shi­raz,as the per­fect choice for this meal.

This sug­ges­tion is from Colin Cowie’s fab­u­lous book Effort­less Ele­gance: “puree oil-cured black olives and extra vir­gin olive oil for a quick and easy ‘pesto.’” Another sug­ges­tion:“Puree arti­choke hearts with gar­lic,pine nuts,and extra vir­gin olive oil.”  (Great book by the way. Every­thing I’ve ever made from it is fabulous!)