A Pesto Lesson

For whatever reason, until last week, it never really occurred to me to make my own basil pesto. It's so easy to buy it in a jar and always tasty, too. I guess I never really how easy it is to make. But while it was easy to make, I managed to kind of screw it up. I definitely learned my lesson.

We got a bunch of basil in a recent CSA box, and I have a basil plant in the backyard. It was only appropriate to make basil pesto for the first time.

Easily enough, I found a recipe in my go-to Betty Crocker Cookbook. I only needed five ingredients, and then all I had to do was mix it in the food processor. Here is the recipe I used.

I made it the day before we used it, which was fine ... but then it was cold when I took it out of the fridge to use it with pasta.

We had a package of frozen ravioli to made with the pesto.

It was easy enough to make--just boil water, and cook the ravioli on a low boil for about eight minutes, drain and serve.

Here's where I messed up: I figured it wouldn't be good to serve the pesto cold ... so I tried heating it up in a saucepan. Bad idea! The Parmesan cheese melted, making it a gooey, stringy mess. Over the pasta, it still tasted good, but it was clumpy and the oil had kind of separated from the rest of the pesto.

I later looked up how to serve pesto, and will do this next time--take about a tablespoon of the hot pasta water, mix it with the pesto and pour over the pasta. Lesson learned!

Needless to say, we both finished our plates of pasta and pesto!