Kale, Spinach, or Baby Broccoli Pesto

This is adapted ever so slightly from Chris Morocco’s recipe. I’ve eliminated pistachios because they aren’t nut that I keep on hand, although, with the broccoli, I used almonds, which worked very well, and I’ve added lemon, because what don’t I add lemon too. And then, I’ve ever so slightly tipped the vegetable to pasta ratio by using 8 ounces of pasta rather than twelve.

Ingredients

1 large bunch Tuscan kale, ribs and stems removed, or 6 ounces of baby spinach or a large bunch of spinach, tough stems trimmed off, or 8 ounces of baby broccoli
8 ounces pasta
2 tablespoons olive oil
zest or juice of lemon — for the spinach pesto, which I made last week, I used the zest, for the kale, which I made last night, I used the juice of the same lemon, both worked equally well
1 garlic clove
1 ounce Parmesan, finely grated, plus more for serving
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
Freshly ground black pepper

Blend olive oil, zest or juice of lemon, garlic, Parmesan together in a food processor or blender

Bring medium or large pot of salted water up to a boil and cook the kale, spinach, or broccoli until bright green and wilted, about 30 seconds and the scoop out with tongs and transfer to a rimmed baking sheet or large mixing bowl; keep water boiling and add pasta, cooking to the packaging specification

Allow kale, spinach, or broccoli to cool slightly and then wring out excess water with your hands — if you are using broccoli, vigorously shaking works better than wringing

Add kale, spinach, or broccoli and 1/4 cup of pasta water — scoop it out of the pot while the pasta is cooking — to the food processor or blender and purée until smooth

A quick note about this, if you are using a blender, you’ll end up with more of a paste like Chris, if you are using a food processor, you’ll end up with more of a very fine purée

Scrape the pesto into the bottom of a large bowl

Reserving 1/2 cup of water, drain the pasta and then transfer it to bowl with pesto; do this, I don’t want to say as quickly as possible, don’t rinse the pasta, don’t worry about shaking all of the excess water, you want to add the pasta while it’s still hot and 1 tablespoon of butter and toss adding pasta cooking liquid by the tablespoon if needed

Serve with additional Parmesan and fresh pepper

Serves about 4, or 2 if you are hungry and don’t feel like making much more

Garlic Scape Pesto

I've had garlic scapes in my fridge for weeks now and I've been meaning to do something with them but time got away from me and the tips just started to wilt, so I blitzed them into scape pesto -- which I plan to use in all sort of things over the next few weeks.

Blend together: 15 garlic scapes, trimmed; 4 tablespoons olive oil; zest and juice of one lemon; salt to taste

Makes a lot of garlic scape pesto that will keep in the fridge for a few weeks.

Lemon-Basil Pesto

I also had basil from the Ithaca Farmers Market in the fridge that was wilting, so I went on a bit of a blending kick and made some lemon-basil pesto too. This is probably controversial but I don't like too much garlic in basil pesto, I think it can really overwhelm the basil.

Blend together: 60g of dry basil leaves; 20g of Parmesan cheese or soft goat cheese; 1 large garlic clove, 3 tablespoons of olive oil, zest of half of a lemon

Two notes, first, my favorite increment of measurement when cooking is weight, but I use volume intermittently but for something like basil, using weight is so, so much easier, I've read so many recipes over the years the include loosely packed or densely packed volume amounts for herbs and I find it incredibly difficult to decipher

And second, yes, Parmesan cheese or soft goat cheese, if you don’t like goat cheese, obviously don’t, but if you do, try it, it makes for a great soft consistency

Makes about 150g of pesto which is about how much you need for 6 servings of pasta.