Presto Pesto

By Caroline Clough in Food on Apr 10, 2006 6:47PM

Chicagoist had every intention of waxing philsophically about the glories of peanut butter this week. But after we made what turned out to be the best pesto of our lives we had to rethink our plans. We had a whole heck of a lot of cilantro left over from the corn chowder we made last week, and we figured what would be better for a Saturday afternoon meal than pasta and pesto?

The most lovely thing about pesto, in our opinion anyway, is how simple it is to make. We've always made a decent pesto, but it always lacked a certain something. It's all about the ratio of one ingredient to the next, and we always managed to be a little bit off. We don't mean to sound arrogant but we nailed this pesto and nailed it good. We most certainly hope that you, too, will feel a certain pride (not to mention glee) when you take a taste.

What You Need
2 cups of cilantro, tightly packed
5 tablespoons Pecorino Romano cheese (or Parmesan)
1 tablespoon goat cheese (the flavor of the goat cheese didn't come out for us, so perhaps you should use closer to three tablespoons if you want that goat cheesy taste)
3 cloves garlic
4 tablespoons olive oil
3 tablespoons pine nuts

What You Do
Put all the ingredients into a food processer or blender, hit the button, and you're basically done. Give the pesto a stir to make sure that all the cilantro has been processed/blended, and that's it. When serving it with pasta you should put about a tablespoon or two on each bowl and mix until the pasta is evenly covered.

Other great ways to use this pesto:
On a turkey sandwich.
In scrambled eggs.
On a pizza.
Mix it in ricotta and then make lasagna.
With smoked salmon and crackers.

The possibilities are endless! Well, we're sure there is an end, technically speaking, but you'd have to make a lot of food to get there.

This recipe makes about a cup and a half of pesto.