Another Pesto recipe

Pesto - made June 5, 2011 from The Art of Simple Food by Alice Waters (book #122)

I write up these posts ahead of time on the weekend when I have more time and publish them during the week when I have less time.  So I'm a little late in thanking Susan at My Mother's Apron Strings for this beautiful apron I won in her May giveaway.  I received it in the mail this past Monday and the pictures don't do it justice on how beautifully made this is.  Thanks, Susan, for the work of art!  You do wonderful work.

Now for this recipe....

I'm trying out another pesto recipe because my basil plants are growing even faster than the weeds in my garden.  Most of the recipes seem pretty similar.  This one calls for pounding the ingredients with a mortar and pestle but I have neither so I cheated and used the food processor.  I also substituted chicken broth for half the olive oil again.  I like pesto but am mindful of how high-calorie it is.

I have to confess I kind of messed up this recipe.  First it only called for 1 garlic clove but I like garlic so I put in 2 cloves.  Uh, that made it a little too garlicky.  Then, although I had all my ingredients out for my mise en place, somehow I missed adding the parmesan cheese so I had to add it in at the very end after I'd already added the pesto to the pasta and shrimp.  Sigh.  In general though, even my messing up aside, I think I like the CIA recipe for pesto better.  This one was a bit too liquid-y.  The flavor of the fresh basil came through better in the CIA recipe.  Probably because I didn't over-garlic that one, ha!

1 cup basil, lightly packed

1 garlic clove, peeled

Salt

¼ cup pine nuts, lightly toasted

¼ cup grated Parmesan cheese

½ cup extra-virgin olive oil

1.     In a mortar and pestle, pound garlic and salt to a paste.  Add pine nuts and continue to pound.  Add parmesan cheese.

2.     Transfer mixture to a bowl.  Coarsely chop the basil leaves and put them in the mortar.  Pound the leaves to a paste.  Return the pounded pine nut mixture to the mortar.  Pound the leaves and pine nut mixture together.  Continue pounding and gradually pour in the olive oil.  Taste for salt and adjust if necessary.