I've never had real pesto before tonight. I make it in the food processor all the time, and I buy ready-made pesto (doubtless made in a giant version of a food processor) sometimes, but I'd never had it the way it's supposed to be done. "Pesto" means "item made with a pestle". After many years of living pestle-bereft, I finally own one; it's black marble, purchased at Ikea for a pittance. And tonight I made real pesto -- walnut pesto, to go on top of whole-wheat pasta with wilted red radicchio and grilled mushrooms -- for the first time.
Actually Ceej and I collaborated on it. We took turns pounding away while sitting in front of the television, taking in the thrillingly squeakeriffic Lakers/Mavericks game and about a billion and a half political ads (hello, Hillary? Girl, I love you, but your shit is weak), and feeding basil to the mortar leaf by leaf, and walnuts when the mixture needed more grist, and olive oil drop by drop or else it splatters, for a long, percussive, strangely satisfying time.
Pestled pesto is alive, somehow. Its springy, claylike consistently is something else entirely, and it tastes warmly, strongly, but softly of basil -- sometimes I think basil is my favorite olfactory experience in the world. The whole house smells like basil now, and our alive, but dormant pesto will surely spring to life when mixed with warm pasta and warmer Mostly Plants. Totally, totally worth the effort.
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