Thank you everyone for the good wishes on my blog-iversary. I really appreciate it. As I mentioned, spring and ramps and asparagus are completely on my mind this week, so after making potatoes with ramps, I decided to tackle ramp pesto. When I stopped eating dairy, one of the things I mourned was pesto, with all its parmesan goodness. Turns out, though, that there is plenty of good pesto to be made without cheese and, sometimes, without nuts either. Ramp pesto is definitely one of them. I based the recipe very loosely on the Spaghetti with Ramps recipe here.
As you see on the picture, I had my ramp pesto with quinoa, though my husband ate it with regular spaghetti and said it was delicious as well. And one note on the quinoa with pesto – while I photographed it with the pesto piled on the quinoa, I found that too strong, so ended up deconstructing my plate and stirring the quinoa and pesto in a bowl, along with additional quinoa. Once I hit the right ratio of pesto to quinoa, it was delicious. The pesto also went well with both the steamed russian kale (what you see peeking out from under the quinoa), and with the curly kale salad (dressed with extra virgin olive oil, sea salt and lemon). And yes, I think nothing of eating two kinds of kale in a meal.
But back to the ramp pesto, here is the recipe:
Ramp Pesto (Gluten-Free, Vegan, Grain-Free, Soy-Free, Nut-Free, Sugar-Conscious)
(four servings)
1/4 -1/3 pound of ramps (about 2 small bunches)
zest of one lemon
1 tablespoon lemon juice
2-3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil (I started with two but added a third to loosen the texture of the pesto)
1/4 teaspoon red chili flakes (optional)
1 teaspoon sea salt
Clean ramps: trim roots and slip off outer skin on bulbs, if loose. Give the ramps a good rinse. Blanch ramps in boiling water for 5-10 seconds (I just dunked them with tongs). Put ramps and all other ingredients in a food processor and puree to desired consistency, adjusting sat and lemon juice for desired flavor. To use with pasta, be sure to thin the pesto out a bit with pasta cooking water.
General Disclosures & Disclaimers
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I love the way this looks, so beautifully green and fresh. I bet it is absolutely delicious. Thanks for sharing the recipe!