Basil Pesto – Recipe

This is the best basil pesto recipe on earth – don’t amend a thing: after many goes at making this it is perfect as it is!

Joan’s Basil Pesto

1c extra virgin olive oil – use the best you can afford, it’s worth it
1 corm (i.e. an entire head of a medium size!) garlic
3 cups tightly packed (washed!) fresh basil leaves – stalks are ok too
3/4 cup pecans or pine nuts – pecans are superb in this but don’t use cashews, they’re yuk!
1/2 tsp salt / grind of fresh black pepper (to taste)
1.5 cups grated parmesan cheese (again the best you can afford to buy)

Place all ingreds except olive oil into a food processor.
Blitz til it becomes a creamy paste, wipe the sides down if required.
Slowly add the oil while still blending.
Voila – simple and delish pesto!

Will keep for a few days (yeah right, it keeps being eaten!) or can be frozen for a few months.

Enjoy!

Last Summer we had basil growing out at Mum and Dad’s. They’d pick armfuls of it and come over and we’d have decadent basil pesto lunches .. hot crusty bread, olive oil, wine, olives, fresh and sun dried tomatoes, cheeses and of course: the star of the show: basil pesto!

Don’t think Dad was gonna share actually 😉