PESTO.- The perfect condiment / sauce / flavor exhancer that you can have on hand!

PESTO.-  What can I tell you about Pesto? There are so many advantages to making your own beginning with controlling the ingredients, no preservatives, colorants, chemicals or anything else you don't need. Never forget that the cleaner your ingredients, the better for you, no doubt. So if you can make your own, do it. Pesto is so easy to make that not only anyone can do it, it's also fast to prepare and yields amazing flavor which you can use on almost everything.... another plus is that it's healthy so if you happen to be on a regimen or diet (keto, Atkins, diabetes, cholesterol, blood pressure or ....) in all probability, you will be able to have it.

PESTO:  It is a sauce that originated from Genoa, Italy which is the capital of Liguria. The classic ingredients are garlic, pine nuts, coarse salt, Basil leaves, a hard cheese like Parmigiano-Reggiano or Pecorino Sardo and then it's blended with olive oil. As other foods throughout the ages arrived and with the assistance of Marco Polo or Columbus, the Moors or the Romans, etc. that were travelling between our continent to theirs or vice versa, major changes and additiones occurred in the world which gave us the "foods of the world". Just imagine if Italy had never gotten tomatoes from us? Or chiles? Pasta? or Potatoes, etc? Spices, herbs, fruits, vegetables and even proteins came into everyone's lives by all these travels and gave us not just original recipes but alternate ingredients as well. Just fantastic!

Why is it called "Pesto"? Because it was made in a mortar and pestle, get it? A molcajete to the rest of us.... Sure, that's the classic preparation method which you still find in Italy but in these fast lives the more common way to preprare it is with a food processor, which I use and makes it a quick result. While getting your ingredients ready to be used ("mise en place") might take you some minutes, you could do these in advance so they're available for you once you're ready to proceed, but we'll get to that, ok?

Now in my case as in any other food preparation, I will adapt, change, add or delete ingredients to suit our taste, to use what's in season or what I can get at the market or even what I feel like at that particular moment, so I've made Pesto with cilantro leaves or mint or other herbs or a mix of them. That goes for the nuts as well as Pine Nuts are quite expensive and I'd rather get them whole in something like Raw Kibe which I LOVE!!  So I usually use Almonds, those big bags at Costco of Raw Almonds are great but you need to peel them for this. (If you don't know how send me a message and I'll give you an easy way to get them peeled or look for a Youtube video) Anyhoo, I use some type of herb, garlic, coarse salt, the cheese is what I have and that's usually Grana Padano which we get at Costco and I do half grated fine and half grated course to have more of a texture. This also goes for the olive oil, I got a big bottle of Extra Virgin Olive Oil at Costco which I use for almost everything including taking tablespoons with Himalayan Salt grated fine into it which makes it really tasty to take (check out the nutritional benefits of taking Olive Oil tablespoons this way and you'll see why...).

So here is everything I used to make my Pesto at home:

2 cups Basil Leaves (I freeze the stalks in plastic to use for other sauces or soups)
2 cups Cilantro Leaves (I have this all the time so don't need to save stalks, I do use them too)
5 small Garlic Cloves (or 2 large, etc) peeled and crushed, chopped fine
1-2 tsp Coarse Salt / Kosher Salt / Salt Flakes, etc.
1/4 - 1/3 cup Grated Cheese (Parmesano-Reggiano / Grana Padano type)
1/3-1/2 cup Almonds, raw, peeled
1/3-1/2 cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil

These ingredients are approximate, depends on your taste. Do it this way, taste and adjust as needed. Experiment, mix. You'll put all the ingredients except the oil in your food processor at once and when you turn it on, on slow at first, you'll drizzle a thin stream of oil as it mixes until you reach your desired consistency. I open the processor in the middle to wipe down the sides of the processor and give it a quick taste before finishing the process. Keep an eye on it, you can always stop, open the food processor to taste or look at the texture, ok?

Also, don't forget that Pesto tastes great on almost anything, so keep trying it on your favorites! One last thing is that if you check the nutritional breakdown of pesto online you will get the store bought versions of this so if you make your own it will be even better tasting and give you more nutrition.

Enjoy this amazing sauce!