Pesto al Gusto

I can’t remember the first time I tasted classic pesto, but I do remember it was love at first bite. That heady blend of basil, parmesan, and garlic—with deep base notes of extra virgin olive oil and buttery pine nuts—was intoxicating. It wasn’t long before I was making this fragrant sauce in my own kitchen.

In fact, it’s the main reason I grow basil in my garden. Sure, I love to be able to step outside to gather fresh basil leaves to make a Caprese salad, but this can also be accomplished with some sprigs from the market. Since large quantities of basil are needed to make pesto  (4 packed cups to make 1½ cups of pesto, generally the amount needed for 16 ounces of pasta), it’s most convenient and economical to grow your own, specifically the variety Basilico Genovese. 

Preferably the basil should be young and tender, without any of the bitterness that can come as the plant matures. That being said, I always make a batch this time of year with basil I put in back in late May, and it tastes just fine. Because removing the leaves from the stems is labor intensive and necessary, I like to set aside time to make a big batch all at once and freeze it in individual containers. The sauce keeps well in the freezer and is like a blast of summer in the middle of winter for those of us who live in northern climates.

To harvest basil, I cut the plant way back, stems and all, and fill up a large trash bag. I haul it into my kitchen and instantly the herb’s fragrance fills the space, transforming it into an Italian cucina. Classic pesto originated in northern Italy, in Genoa specifically. I had the good fortune to eat it in its native home several years ago, not far from Genoa.

My family was visiting Italy with my mom, my sister, and her two kids, and that simple but memorable meal was, for me, one of the highlights of trip. We had spent the day hiking the trails of Cinque Terre, 

followed by a swim in the Ligurian Sea. 

By the time we arrived at the restaurant, we were ravenous. When our bowls of pasta were served, we devoured them, washed down with some of the local wine. Whenever I eat pesto pasta now, the memory of that beautiful day resurfaces. One of the best things about food, after all, is the memories it carries.

Categorized as a pounded herb sauce, pesto gets its name from the Italian verb pestare, which means to pound or to crush. Traditionally this was done in a marble mortar using a wooden pestle, but today the modern food processor makes easy work of the process. 

According to custom, the ingredients are blended in a specific order. First the garlic is mashed, followed by the pine nuts, which forms a paste.  Then the basil leaves are added, along with a bit of coarse salt that helps to break down the leaves. Olive oil, the base of so much of Italian cuisine, follows; finally grated Parmigiano Reggiano imparts an incomparable tang and creaminess. Purists would add a little pecorino as well, but it’s not necessary. 

Although simple to make, when pesto is stirred into pasta, slathered on flatbread, or smeared on a sandwich, it’s transformative. I have a hard time thinking of foods that aren’t improved by it. It makes a delicious condiment spooned over grilled chicken, fish, or vegetables, or served with bruschetta or a soft cheese. It jazzes up a cream sauce or mayonnaise, and can even stand alone as a dip. Add a dollop to a salad, tuck it into an omelet, or swirl it into a soup just before serving, as is done with pistou, a nutless Southern French version of pesto. Once you start incorporating pesto into your regular meals, you’ll wonder how you ever lived without it.

I never tire of classic pesto, but variations on the five main ingredients keep things interesting. You can switch out one ingredient, like using a different nut, for a subtle change. Walnuts are a popular replacement for pine nuts, making the pesto earthier. Almonds, hazelnuts, and pistachios are all good options as well.

Another subtle change is to vary the oil, replacing it completely or by half. Since there are so many excellent choices out there, this is an easy way to play around with flavor. I especially like using part walnut oil or a few tablespoons of argan oil for a more pronounced nuttiness. Simply omitting the garlic is another simple, but not so subtle, change, or you can merely dial it down by using garlic chives or scapes instead. If you’re sticking with garlic cloves, makes sure they’re fresh, young cloves, which are less pungent. To lighten the pesto, omit the cheese. This will make the sauce less creamy, and the taste of the oil will be more noticeable.

You can also of course alter the recipe completely, such as making a cilantro-cashew-sesame oil combination; I like to serve this Asian-inspired pesto with grilled fish. Arugula pesto, another favorite, has the benefit of being much less labor intensive than basil pesto since you don’t have to remove the leaves from the stems. It’s also easier to find large quantities of arugula (preferably baby arugula) in the market, and the sauce stays bright green instead of turning dark from oxidizing like basil pesto can. 

Watercress is another alternative to basil, as are mixed herbs, which you can vary according to the season or the dish you’re serving the pesto with. Getting creative with different combinations is one of the beauties of pesto. The only rule I suggest following is to use the highest quality ingredients you can find. 

Even though the official end date of summer is still a couple weeks away, today—Labor Day—always feels like the last day. These final few weeks with their muted colors and touch of coolness in the air are some of my favorite weeks of the year, but they also bring with them a bit of melancholy. It won’t be long before the remaining basil in my garden will be nipped by frost. Knowing I have an ample supply of pesto in my freezer if I need a taste of summer—or of Italy—in the coming months makes this transition easier.

CLASSIC BASIL PESTO

MAKES ABOUT 1½ CUPS

2-3 cloves garlic

1/3 cup pine nuts

4 cups packed basil leaves—preferably Genovese

2/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil

½ cup grated Parmigiano Reggiano

3 tablespoons grated pecorino

coarse sea salt, to taste

freshly ground black pepper

Using a food processor, process the garlic and pine nuts. Add the basil, olive oil, and cheese and process until smooth.  Using a spatula, push down any basil on the sides of the bowl. Season with salt and pepper and process for 15 more seconds.

*Pesto keeps for up to 3 days in the refrigerator in an airtight container. To preserve its color, pour olive oil over the surface, or cover it with a small piece of plastic wrap. To freeze, put 1½ cups of pesto in individual containers. Freeze for up to 6 months.

Planet Lovely

May is the month when those of us who live in Vermont (or much of the Northeast for that matter) are transplanted from Planet Harsh to Planet Lovely. The world truly is transformed. For the next six months we live in a state of green, or of green green, as a German friend said to me yesterday, recalling a description from a childhood story. The young grass and unfolding leaves on the trees and shrubs are so vivid they almost glow. At this point early in the season, there are myriad shades of green, too numerous to count. But as the summer progresses, they tend to converge into a more uniform green, for which perhaps the state was named: vert mont, or green mountain from the French. My favorite patch of green though, my herb garden, remains a mosaic of different shades, from the bright shoots of Chives poking up through the ground

Inconstant Gardener (or Life Lessons I’ve Learned from Gardening)

First official day of fall today, although we had our first hard frost a few nights ago, always a more definitive marker for the end of summer than a date on the calendar. It’s felt like fall for a few weeks now, though, with Isabel back at college and Faye absorbed in her busy high school life. Chris is back to teaching, and I’m trying to buckle down to a more productive work schedule myself. At the same time, September weather is usually the best of the year, with clear skies, crisp air, and a gentle sun. It drifts through the skylight above my desk, pulling me away from my computer and outside for a hike, bike, kayak or, so I can reassure myself I’m still being productive, to the garden.

On Bristol Pond

Change is in the air in Vermont. Hot, hazy days of summer have given way to crystalline skies and breezes that feel like cool silk on your skin. The color palette in the meadows and mountains has started to shift from vibrant greens to deeper, muted tones. In my extended family, a lot of change has happened recently as well: a wedding, a funeral, and my oldest daughter Isabel headed off to college for the first time.

Dinner Under the Pergola

To me, the finest summer meal celebrates our garden, which is just coming into its own right about now.  Since it’s on the small side, I usually need to supplement with the produce of other local growers and producers, so the meal becomes a local foods fête in the best sense of the word. When the weather cooperates, I like to eat under our pergola, which feels like an airy room framed on one side by the garden, and on the other by a row of raspberry bushes, with grape vines, wisteria, and weeping larch entwining overhead. If asked to visualize a happy place, I would put dinner under our pergola at the top of my list.

The Garden in Winter

Although the garden is now dormant, much beauty can be found there during this time of year.

Stone wall

Tree shadow

In Praise of Brussels Sprouts

I’ve never met a vegetable that I didn’t like. Even the lowliest of peasant fare. In fact, one of my favorites is the much maligned Brussels sprout. With the first hint of fall, I crave this humble vegetable. Maybe it has something to do with my own peasant roots on my father’s Irish side of the family, often in conflict with the Polish nobility on my mother’s side. According to family lore, we're descendents of Napoleon and his Polish mistress the Countess Marie Walewska, and the son they had together (hence my affinity for France and my taste for haute cuisine perhaps?). 

Marie Walewska

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Profuse weeds, tendonitis, and tainted compost—the garden has presented more than its usual share of challenges this year. Weeds are nothing new, but with the record-breaking warm weather they’ve been more out of control than ever. Keeping up with the weeds brought on a flair-up of tendonitis in my elbow, something I’ve dealt with before but this time it’s been particularly tenacious. And then there was the contaminated compost, a mysterious occurrence that has devastated hundreds of Vermont gardeners who thought they were buying organic compost, only to find out that it was polluted with two herbicides that are banned in the state. Not the best gardening season by a long shot.

Despite the setbacks, the garden has had its rewards. Early crops of French breakfast radishes,

Putting in the Garden, Part 2

Seeds fascinate me. How a living plant is contained within a tiny capsule, sometimes no bigger than a pinprick, is truly mind-boggling when you stop to think about it. With a little water and sunlight and the right kind of soil, a whole plant, even a tree, can grow from this miniscule speck.

Some of my garden vegetables I purchase as plants, as I described in my post last week, but the ones I can start from seed right in the ground are even more satisfying.  I’ve tried different seed companies, but am most loyal to The Cook’s Garden. They started out as a family-owned mail order company based in Londonderry, Vermont, but have since been bought up by Burpee. While the catalogue has gotten glossier, I haven’t noticed a decline in the quality of their seeds. They still offer an excellent selection of organic seeds, European and American heirlooms, and their signature seed blends, such as their Provencal mesclun.

Putting in the Garden, Part 1

Ahhh, the garden. Dirt under my fingernails, the smell of soil, sweat, and sunscreen, and a soreness that lasts for days. It’s a wonder that I love it as much as I do. But I do love it, the whole process, from the time I order my seeds in late winter all the way up until I harvest the final Brussels sprouts around Thanksgiving. It’s my little corner of the world that I can control, to some extent, and beautify; my playtime and therapy all rolled into one.

The key to a healthy garden is of course the soil. When I started gardening twenty years ago after we bought our house, our soil was ok: previously neglected, but not in terrible shape because the yard used to be a horse pasture. Over the years, we’ve added lots of kitchen compost as well as composted cow manure, so the soil is now wonderfully fertile and friable.

Measuring  just fifteen  by nineteen feet, my garden is not very big. Each year when I put it in, the space always feels too small, but as the season progresses I’m amazed at the amount of vegetables it produces. It’s framed on the left by an unruly perennial bed and along the back by a pergola that Chris and I built around ten years ago, using cedar from a row of spindly trees we took down on the property.

Brunch, Blooms, and Boules: Some Thoughts on Mother's Day

I’ve been a mother now for almost seventeen years. During my first pregnancy with Isabel, I remember feeling as if I was about to jump into an abyss. Looking back after all these years, my feelings were accurate. It has been an abyss, but the most joyous and fulfilling kind. Motherhood is a hotly debated topic these days, and women are quick to judge each other about the kinds of parents they choose to be. All I know is that I’ve made the right choice for me and my family and that I’m grateful to have been able to make that choice.

To celebrate the day, we went out to brunch like we usually do. It was the morning after the prom, so we picked Isabel up at her friend’s house and drove a few miles down the road to Tourterelle. A country inn and French restaurant, Tourterelle fuses classic French cuisine with local products to create a winning combination.