Remember when I posted a photo of my pesto dinner and kept promising to share the recipe?
I never promised a timely post, but I’ve finally gotten my act together.
Since I’m not a chef, I’m not really sure about the proper measuring techniques on things like lettuce and fresh herbs. My scale is like fistful, really big fistful, and double fisting it. Not exactly Julia Childs status. So I’m apologizing in advance for the way I describe the amounts I used.
Really Green Pesto
[vegan, gluten free, FODMAPs free, nut free]
Ingredients:
- 2 big fists of spinach
- 1 cup of fresh parsley (meaning the leafy tip portion after it’s been de-stemmed)
- 1/4 cup fresh basil (approximately 0.5 ounces)
- 1/2 cup hemp seeds
- 1/4 –1/3 cup olive oil
- 1/2 tsp salt
Directions:
Boil water. Cook pasta. Drain almost all the water. Add a glug of olive oil. Mix it throughout noodles. Set aside.
Wash and de-stem parsley and basil.
In a food processor, combine hemp seeds, parsley, basil, and spinach. Pulse until they are just past the point of a fine chop, scraping down the sides as needed. Then add oil slowly (I gave a range because I wanted to account for different preferences in thickness). I’m also pretty iffy on the amounts of herbs since there’s definitely room for error in how each person interprets the measurements. In any event, I used the full amount of oil because I like love olive oil. And without it, the recipe is pretty much just a green smoothie.
Scoop pesto over pasta and serve.
For FODMAPs people, using garlic infused extra virgin olive oil (like Garlic Gold) offers awesome flavors without the fructans.
FYI, this yielded a ton of pesto – enough for a large family (my mind just flashed to those insanely cheesy Olive Garden commercials). If you’re making it as a solo dish, you can half the recipe but I’m not sure how the food processor will do with less. Personally I’d err on the side of more (shocker). Worse case scenario, you have leftovers for a while.
Pesto is pretty versatile so you can still do tons of new and interesting things with the extra portion (sandwich spread, salad dressing, veggie/pita dip, etc.). And if you get totally sick of it, you can freeze it for later use.
Don’t forget to swipe up the extra with some good sourdough.
And while you’re add it, use some more olive oil.
I love the hemp seeds in this. Awesome addition.
That pesto looks so gooooood! I love all things green! I was that weird kid who thought the green ketchup was cool…
I just want it with the bread! 🙂
nothing beets a good pesto!! love anything extra green too haha
This looks so great Elise! I love hemp seeds, and hate pine nuts so I always hated pesto. Duh, use a different seeds/nuts. Perfect.
I’ve always maintained that you could put pesto on a shingle and it would be delicious. Not that I would recommend it, but you get my point.
Does the hemp seed give it a certain taste?
I’ve always used pine nuts or walnuts, but I might try this
I just thought of something, have you tried putting in nutritional yeast? To act as the parmesan cheese. That combination sounds really good
I love that it uses so much spinach! I am going to try it tonight with the abundance of baby spinach out in our garden. I’m thrilled to find a new use for it!
Pingback: Pesto Proud « Mint Chocolate Chick
I really want this. I think I psych myself out sometimes and think I can have regular pasta but then I get the pains. Perhaps I should take this into account sooner rather than later. Need me some Mara’s.
check out the fodmaps post i just put up…oh denial…how i love thee…
i like the texture that hemp seeds add, but nooch on top would be a flavor powerhouse. good call.
hemp seeds are similar to pinenuts in that they are a little nutty, but a little cheesy. hard to describe. they’re good!
ooh, i think a lot of us have been waiting for this one 🙂