How to make the Trenette al Pesto:
"Pesto": the word pesto means "pounded," as
traditionally pesto was made by grinding the ingredients together by hand
in a marble mortar and pestle.
To make the pesto, place all ingredients except oil and pasta in a marble mortar. Process, to
a puree. While processing in the mortar, gradually add oil until absorbed.
Toss with the trenette. Serve hot. If you don’t have a
marble mortar, use a food processor or blender, the resulting pesto will be very
good also, even if not at the same level of high culinary delight.
To preserve pesto for a long time: you can freeze the pesto,
prepared without the parmesan cheese, in small plastic cups, Tupperware
containers or ice cube trays. Keep the pesto in the freezer until you need
it. When you need to use it, just bring the frozen pesto to room
temperature, add the Parmesan cheese and your pesto is ready to toss over
hot pasta or whatever!
Serves 6
A bit of history of Italian cuisine:
For centuries Ligurian sailors plied the seas as part of
the spice trade, bringing to Europe the exotic products of the Far East and
Africa. When they returned from their long, arduous voyages, the sailors had had
their fill of fish and spicy food. What they wanted instead was fare that spoke
of their homeland, made from vegetables fresh from the gardens and farms that
cling to the Ligurian hillsides. As a result, the dish that is now most closely
identified with this region is pasta al pesto, noodles bathed in an intensely
green and fragrant sauce.
The pesto recipe took the form we know in the mid-nineteenth century: the
recipe first appears in writing in the Ratto brothers’ 1865 Cuciniera
genovese, where it is described as "pesto is a mince of garlic and basil"
and used as a sauce with which "to dress all varieties of pasta".
Ligurians almost make a religion of their devotion to
pesto sauce and its main ingredient, fresh basil. While they generally favor
fresh herbs in their cooking, it is basil that inspires the most interest.
There is, however, no uniformity of opinion as to the best pesto recipes or its
best uses. Every village, and for that matter probably every family, has its own
recipe for pesto sauce and its favorite shape of pasta to use with the sauce.
For example, the Genoese prefer a sharp, pungent pesto sauce which they serve
with ravioli filled with veal and cheese. Many people opt for a mild pesto
sauce, sometimes with cream or butter added. In many areas, the preferred "pasta
al pesto"
is trenette, a sort of plump local version of linguine. In still other areas,
they dispense with the pasta altogether and add the pesto to their local version
of minestrone or to fish soup.
The basic ingredients of pesto sauce are common to all
these recipes: fresh basil leaves, cheese (either Parmigiano Reggiano or
Pecorino), pine nuts or walnuts, garlic, olive oil and salt and pepper. The
great debate, and the great fun, about pesto is deciding on the proper
proportions with which to combine these ingredients and whether to add any
extras. Ultimately, with some experimentation, you can make pesto that suits
your tastes exactly, just like every cook in Liguria.
One thing to remember: to make a true pesto you need to use a marble mortar, try
yourself and you will see the difference in the pesto
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