INGREDIENTS
2 cups dandelion greens
2 to 3 garlic cloves
1/2 to 3/4 cups pepitas
1/2 to 2/3 cup olive oil
1/4 cup nutritional yeast
1/2 tsp salt
1 or 2 tbs lemon juice
INSTRUCTIONS
As with our previously-posted, more traditional Basil Pesto Recipe, here are a few ways to do this.
Method 1: To destress (if you’re not in a hurry!) get your molcajete out (your mortar and pestle for those of you not familiar with the Spanish term with Nahuatl roots) and put your strength into grinding. I recommend you do the garlic first, then your seeds of choice, and add the greens last, a little bit at a time. Your setting yourself up for frustration if you pile the greens in—it’s just a lot harder to grind so many layers of leaves at a time. For me, it’s unsatisfying! But if you add two or three leaves at a time, you can really take pleasure in the meditative transformation of the beautiful leaves into a bright paste. After the garlic, seeds and greens is ground, scrape it out into a dish and then add the salt, nutritional yeast and, finally, the olive oil. This is where you decide how thick to make your pesto. If you don’t want it so think, add more oil.
Method 2: Put all ingredients in a food processor or blender. Or, put it in a slightly oversized dish (like a 2-cup pyrex container, for example) and use the immersion blender directly in the dish. This is not the fastest, but by far, the easiest clean up if you can manage to keep the immersion blender immersed below the level of olive oil so that it doesn’t spray everywhere when you start to blend.
Final tip: It took me a long time to assimilate our italian roommate’s discovery that the way to mess up pesto is by adding too much garlic. I love garlic so that was hard to hear. I think he’s right though because the power of raw garlic can easily overwhelm. (This from a person who’s mouth waters at the thought of taking a bite of the fresh whole garlic clove!) So, the tip is—When in doubt, add less garlic.
So many ways to use this pesto—Serve as a dip with crusty bread, crackers, chopped veggies or even your eggplant or zucchini fries; over your favorite protein; add a spoonful to your soup; top your quiche or frittata with it, or…to use this week’s CSA items—grill up some beets and purple potatoes and smother them with pesto OR…make yourself a grilled portobello ‘burger’ (yes, basically just grill the mushroom) and dress it with this fresh and healthy pesto and a handful of broccoli microgreens!