Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Homemade Special Pesto Sauce

My basils are growing a bit too tall.. and one of them is starting to sprout flower buds..

Even though I know the flower buds are edible, I don't want my basils to flower because once they do, the leaves will lose a bit of their flavour.

So it's time to prune my basil plants.

And I couldn't think of what better to do with them then make pesto sauce.

I'm calling my pesto sauce a "Homemade Special Pesto Sauce" because:
1. Obviously, it's homemade.. it's even home-grown actually.. supplemented with some store-bought sweet basils.. (My sweet basils are doing very miserably)
2. It's special because I'm using a few types of basil leaves - sweet basils, thai basils and cinnamon basils..

Ingredients Used
A bundle of fresh mixed basils
Very little garlic
A handful of pine nuts, lightly toasted
Extra-virgin olive oil
Some lemon juice
Freshly ground black pepper and salt, to taste

What I did
1. Throw the basils into food processor, pulse
2. Throw the garlic and pinenuts in, pulse
3. Pour in the oil, lemon juice and pulse
4. Add in more oil, if needed. Season with pepper and salt
 
I should add in some freshly grated Parmesan cheese actually but because I wanted to freeze my pesto, I didn't.

If you are using it fresh, add in the cheese before you pour in the oil as the oil helps blend everything together.


A bowlful of fresh basil leaves... gives less than 1 jam jar of pesto sauce..

This jar is going into the freezer. I'm going to use it for a pizza next week.

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