Food & Recipes - grace grits and gardening

Homemade Basil Pesto

May 28, 2014 By Talya Tate Boerner

Since I have lots of basil growing in my garden, I decided to make homemade basil pesto last weekend. There is nothing like fresh pesto. And if you’ve never made it before, you’ll be amazed at how easy it is.

Homemade Basil Pesto

Print Recipe

Prep Time 5

Cook Time 5

Total Time 10

Servings: 1 /2 cup

Ingredients Method Notes

Ingredients

1 cup tightly packed fresh basil
2 Tablespoons pine nuts
1 clove garlic
1 inch chopped garlic scapes optional
1/3 cup olive oil
sea salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
2 Tablespoons freshly grated Italian Parmesan or Pecorino

Method

Mix first 5 ingredients using food processor or stick blender.
Add cheese and pulse again until blended.
Refrigerate.

Notes

I used chopped garlic scapes because I had a bunch. If you aren't familiar, scapes are the flower shoots or stems of the garlic plant. They have a mild garlicky flavor—sort of a garlic flavored scallion. Feel free to omit this from the recipe, if you prefer.

As you can see, I didn’t chop my garlic scapes. Easier to blend if you do…

While basil is in season and readily available, you may want to make a large batch and freeze for later, but freeze before adding the grated cheese.

Use as a spread on sandwiches. Mix with pasta. Be creative! Pesto is great to have on hand. HERE’s a 25 recipe roundup using pesto—all the dishes look fantastic.

On Memorial Day, we used it on John’s amazing smoked basil burgers instead of mayo or mustard. (Recipe coming to the blog soon!)

Are you a pesto fan? What’s your favorite pesto recipe?

Grace Grits and Gardening

Farm. Food. Garden. Life.

“A good deed is never lost; he who sows courtesy reaps friendship, and he who plants kindness gathers love.”
― Saint Basil

Memorial Day FUN!

May 24, 2014 By Talya Tate Boerner

Memorial Day weekend. The lake was usually chilly. Sometimes downright cold. That first plunge into summer, breathtaking.

Was the water level high or low? That was an important question. We studied the shoreline while waiting for the ferry.

The answer affected our hot dog roast.

Even when the lake swallowed all but the tallest trees of our sandy island, we tied the boat to a willow branch and floated on rafts above white sand. New rafts that took forever to inflate.

The sand was still down there. We could see it through clear water.

One time (or several times) the water lapped the top of the concrete picnic tables. We used them as jumping platforms instead of eating spots. A different sort of fun. But even when our island was hidden, we never missed a hot dog roast. Momma anchored to a rocky edge of shoreline, not quite flat but almost, and built a fire, soldiering on without sand.

Happy Memorial Day Weekend!

Grace Grits and Gardening

Farm. Food. Garden. Life.

Musical Pairing:

Pontoon – Little Big Town

Nana’s Strawberry Cake (the real one)

May 23, 2014 By Talya Tate Boerner

Nana’s Strawberry Cake!

Alrighty. After baking the worst strawberry cake ever for my son’s 21st birthday (read about it HERE , or we can just pretend it never happened…), I’m going back to our old family recipe. Nana’s Strawberry Cake. Straight from her vintage recipe box. You’ll want to keep this one.

I love seeing her handwriting on all the recipes…

Nana or Momma made this cake for all my birthdays. Served on the dock with a side of old-fashioned, homemade ice cream (hand-cranked with rock salt), this is the stuff of summer. We ate fast before the July sun created strawberry milkshakes. Sticky face? Jump in the lake for easy cleanup.

The cake is moist and luscious as strawberry cake was intended. It’s one of those “cheat” cakes because it starts with a boxed white cake mix and a package of strawberry Jell-o. Ask me if I care.

Nope.

I’ve learned my lesson.

One bite and I’m delivered back to my childhood.