Recipe: Fresh handmade pesto

A few days ago, my tiny little adorable Taiwanese mother returned from her morning at the traditional market and triumphantly announced that she had purchased basil and wanted to make pesto. I was all for it.
    "All we need now is some pine nuts and parmesan cheese," I piped in.
    "...Why?" asked my mother.
    "...Because that's the way to do it?" was my response.
    "Are you sure?" was the retort.
(This continued for a while)
Either way, she caved and we went out and bought some pine nuts and parmesan.

This morning I was summoned to the kitchen, and was greeted by this:

   "Didn't you want to make pesto?" asked my mother, "I went out and got more basil this morning, so get started on this if you want."
Excitedly, I started pulling out the ingredients and went to move our mixer from its lonely little corner... until my mother stopped me. Apparently, her mixer is to be used only for juices, and whenever she watched cooking shows the pesto was always made by hand. Unfazed by the daunting task unwittingly laid out before me by my own mother, I chopped.

And I chopped.

And I chopped...

And I chopped - until I ended up with this gorgeous jar of what seemed, and smelled, like a mixture of tea rinds and freshly mowed grass. Oh, my arms also felt a bit like jelly.

Then, with the green tinge of basil juice and scent clinging to my fingers, I turn to deal with a more pungent ingredient: garlic.

There are three cloves pictures here, but my mother then subsequently took over the chopping board and proceeded to smash up five more cloves to add to the mixture. People deal with garlic differently. If you're Jamie Oliver, you leave the skin on, throw the entire thing into a masher and call it organic when you're actually just being lazy. If you're Nigella Lawson, you take a huge pan, smash the garlic, throw it in a mixer, have a cocktail and some chocolate. And if you're Anthony Bourdain you have a beer and tell the garlic to go.... cuff itself (Yeah, I have no idea what to substitute that with). I prefer to slice through the root end, but not through the skin on the other side, and pull some skin off in the process.

Like-a-so.

I then smash the garlic with the knife by placing a few firm and assertive punches with the heel of my palm to the flat side of the blade. If your knife is heavy enough, feel free to just smack the garlic until it's obediently flattened - you know, just a few love taps. Be very careful, though, because incidents of garlic pieces flying across the kitchen or onto your clothes or into your eyes have been documented.

But there you have it, obediently flattened garlic. Don't forget to peel off the skin! (Unless you're the lovely Mr. Oliver) The next part is my favorite: dicing. It's more of a fine pureeing by hand, actually. Just dice and mince the living daylights out of these poor root vegetables until either your arm cramps or these chunks become a paste.

When that's done, you dump your glorious pile of finely minced garlic into your quaint little jar where your basil currently resides, and then the heat is on. No, quite literally, you turn on the stove and heat up a pan. This next process is an art.

Toast the pine nuts. Taste the pine nuts. Feel the pine nuts. Don't burn them. Just throw them in the pan and toss them around. They should start releasing their oils about 5 minutes over medium-low heat, and soon after that they should start browning a little bit. If you're like me, you'll pick out around half of the pine nuts by the time they're done, so maybe start out with double the amount you'd regularly use. IT'S NOT MY FAULT! THEY'RE SO DARNED DELICIOUS TOASTED.

Once they're done, you don't want to burn them, you can either chop them up (good luck), go at 'em with a mortar and pestle, or throw them in a plastic bag and pound that 'ish up with a mallet. I opted for the last option, thank you mommy for the suggestion.

So when that's done, you place this gorgeous crumbly pine nutty mess in with your jar of mangled basil and garlic, and whip out this dude:

The parmesan. If I were not in Taiwan, I would have bought an entire wheel of top notch parmesan and just went to town with my microplane zester, but alas I am no longer in cheeseland (GAH I MISS FRANCE) so I have to settle with this. Good enough. Oh well, just throw it all in. Give a few good twists of black pepper and a few pinches of salt. Taste test as you mix to see if you need more salt.

Then, it's time to whip out the EVO. For all y'all who aren't refined enough to get this (hardy har har, I'm just being facetious) that means extra virgin olive oil. Olive oil would work too, but EVO is the most ideal for salad dressing and marinades because it has a lower acidic level (I think?), so in this case, it would also be the best companion for your pine nuts, basil leaves, garlic, and parmesan crumbs.

Give it a few nice drizzles to get started on the mixing process, and just slowly pour more in as you continue mixing. Depending on how dry or wet you like it (HA!), just kind of wing the amount of oil you add as you go. If you're smart, you will mix in a larger flatter bowl first instead of choking your stirring options like I did in this case. However, if you decide to be lazy and just mix your concoction in the jar you will keep it in, like I did in this case, a long spoon or a long pair of chopsticks should work. Yes, I am Asian, get over it.

And there you have it! Homemade (and arduously handmade) pesto. While this was sitting in the fridge, I hopped on out to Costco to pick up a rack of lamb, so pictures to come of lamb, smothered in pesto and baked to a frenzy.

Hope you all enjoyed this!