(no subject)

[coraa]

Three culinary lessons of the day:

* You can make good pesto out of practically any combination of nuts, greenery and cheese, plus olive oil, salt, pepper and garlic. (Okay, I probably wouldn't recommend, e.g., pistachios, beet greens and chipotle cheddar, but nevertheless.) This one? Pecans, parsley, soft cheese from the farmer's market. Mmm. (It's going over pre-prepared butternut squash ravioli.)

* Golden beets are a godsend. They may not have quite as assertively beet-y a taste as regular red beets, but they also don't make me look like I just survived a knife fight.

* Beets and apples roasting in the oven smell awesome.

Comments

[porfinn.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure if you meant combining all of the non-recommended pesto ingredients together (that does not sound tasty to me either), but I had a pistachio-pesto Friday night and it was quite satisfactory!

Beets are excellent and odd.

"The beet is the most intense of vegetables. The radish, admittedly, is more feverish, but the fire of the radish is a cold fire, the fire of discontent not of passion. Tomatoes are lusty enough, yet there runs through tomatoes an undercurrent of frivolity. Beets are deadly serious."
-- Jitterbug Perfume by Tom Robbins.

Once upon a time I was extremely fond of that novel. I'm not sure if I should re-read it or not. But it is worth reading just for the first page about which dribbles on about beets for a few more paragraphs.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

I think pistachio pesto would be good, I'm just not sure it'd be good with beet greens and chipotle cheddar. ;) (Really, I couldn't think of any nuts that I think would be unilaterally bad in pesto, whereas I'm not sure I would want to eat beet green or chipotle cheddar pesto under any circumstances.)

Beets are deadly serious! And they have a tendency to stain everything. Golden beets are like beets after they have been attacked by vampires.

[morganlf.livejournal.com]

K. and I made sunflower seed pesto once...it was...kinda nasty. :-) We've stuck with walnuts, pecans, and almonds since then!

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

Actually, a beet green/pistachio/chipotle cheddar pesto sounds very good to me. The best thing to do with beet greens is sautee them in butter and vinegar with a little sugar, and that would go pretty well with pistachios, and the cheddar would give it a nice smokey kick. I'd try it, but no one here but me eats pistachios.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

If you ever do try it, let me know how it turns out!

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Okay, i'm stuck laughing at the things to avoid in pesto, and now all I want to do is add to the list.

Kale and cabbage... probably not the best pesto greens...

[clairebaxter.livejournal.com]

Walnuts sounds good. I tried almonds in pesto, and they end up in too big chunks and also manage to suck all the liquid out. I put in three or four times the olive oil and it was still dry. I usually just avoid the cheese, 'cause I haven't known how to substitute for the parmesan -- knowing I can use any cheese helps immensely. A soft goat cheese could be so good...

[porfinn.livejournal.com]

I much prefer adding sunflower seeds sprinkled over cabbage (red or green) with a nice vinaigrette. The crunchy little seeds and the crunchy cabbage seem compliment each other since I never seem to get enough crunchy!