EC Montreal’s recipe of the week is pesto pasta! It is officially summer and a lot of Montrealers grow their own vegetable and herb garden. There is something really special about going into your own backyard and picking from nature’s garden in preparation for your next meal! Many Montreal restaurants have their own gardens and can serve their ingredients from their garden to the table. Joe Beef is one of these restaurants. They have been named one of the best restaurants in the world! The last time I dined there, it was so nice to see the cooks going to the back garden with their scissors and baskets in hand and coming back into the restaurant with fresh herbs and lettuce. You can’t get more fresh than that! Joe Beef’s menu is all local, including the meat and dairy from local farms in Quebec.
In my garden at home I have a grape vine, tomatoes, radishes, lettuce, a plum tree, a lime tree, green onion, mint, parsley and basil. This weekend was Father’s Day and it was lovely preparing the meal with items from my own garden. I used the tomatoes, lettuce, green onion and limes for the salad and used the basil and parsley for my pesto pasta. The radishes need more time to grow, but I soon will have sliced radishes to add to my salads.
So, in honour of Montreal gardens, this week’s recipe is Pesto Pasta. For my version of pesto, you will need the following ingredients:
3 cups of basil
1 cup of parsley
3 cloves of garlic
1/2 cup of olive oil
1/2 cup of pine nuts
1/2 cup of Parmesan cheese
salt and pepper to taste
past of your choice (Cheese tortellini or tagliatelle is my favourite to use)
In a large pot, bring salted water to boil. In the meantime, place your pine nuts, garlic, basil, parsley, cheese and olive oil in a blender. Blend until smooth. Add salt and pepper to your liking. When the water is boiling, add your pasta and cook until “al dente”. Strain and add your pesto sauce. Add extra Parmesan cheese and serve. You can serve it with a cherry tomato and cucumber salad.
We hope you will give this recipe a try. We will be posting it on Microsoft Teams where you can access your French or English online lessons. Buon appetito!
