a (little) healthier pesto

another old post. last one, i swear. but now i'm really REALLY craving that pesto, and our basil plant just froze. what's a girl to do?! #roughlife

it's been a while! as in a-month-and-a-half while.

anyways

my mom has these MASSIVE basil plants in the backyard and i've been itching to whip up some pesto. so on this fine labor day, i decided to take advantage of my free time. first, i jammed to Ingrid Michaelson's new album...this song got repeated about 36 times. then, i got to work. i'd found a few recipes i was considering, but none of them seemed quite right. so i decided to wing it.

i grabbed a ton of basil, some almonds, parmesean cheese, garlic, and unpictured olive oil. (the bottle wasn't worthy of my photo) i also ended up throwing in even MORE basil/almonds/garlic. & some salt/pepper of course.

first i toasted a cup of almonds (i'm funny cause it was a cup measurement, and i took a picture of them in a cup...ha ha)

then i chopped up my garlic into about 5 chunks per clove. i threw the almonds, garlic, and parmesean cheese into the food proccessor and pulsed it until it was mostly all uniformly ground. make sure you don't let it go for too long or the almonds will turn into almond butter and heaven knows you don't want garlic-cheese flavored almond butter. trust me, i've been there. ew. 

next i added the basil in a couple handfuls at a time, with incorportations of olive oil each time. i pulsed it all until it was the pesto texture i wanted. it's a deeply personal matter, really. some people like the chunky pesto, some like the so-creamy-it's-almost-liquid stuff, and some, like me, prefer a happy medium.

i ground in a little salt & pepper to taste and voila! pesto.

the color is a little off-putting. toasted almond probs. but the flavor from the toasted almonds is worth the unphotogenic-ness. if that's a word. if it's not, it should be. 

anyways

the pesto turned out great. tastes like summer. it's super basil-y, with a definitive nuttiness from the almonds. which, by the way, are way cheaper than pine nuts. and have less fat. speaking of less fat, you'll notice by reading my recipe below that i didn't use much cheese. that was intentionally to keep it a little lighter. sometimes i eliminate it altogether. i just felt like living on the edge today. 

to be honest, a lot of it's already gone. i slathered it on wheat thins straight out of the food processor...we were out of bread...#lunch? and used it as red sauce on my whole wheat pizza for dinner. i might go back to school tomorrow with green hair or something due to excessive basil consumption. worth it.

a (little) healthier pesto 

5 packed cups fresh basil, washed

1 cup almonds 

about 1/2 cup olive oil 

1/4 cup parmesean cheese

4 cloves garlic, chopped roughly

salt and pepper to taste

lemon juice (optional)

toast the almonds on medium heat for around 7 minutes, or until uniformly golden. put in food processor with cheese and chopped garlic, and pulse until everything is about the same size of crumb. you're kind of going for the look of bread crumbs. start adding in the basil a couple handfuls at a time, pouring in a couple tablespoons of the olive oil with each addition. repeat until all the basil is incorporated. it could take more than 1/2 cup of olive oil, just use what you need for the basil to blend in. sprinkle in salt and pepper until it's perfect for you. add lemon juice if you're feeling zesty. (ha ha) 

store in fridge for about a week, freezer for up to 6 months.

yields around 1 1/2 cups pesto

-mads