WATERCRESS PESTO
This vibrant pesto is clean, healthy, makes the most wonderful sauce for many things and keeps in the fridge for weeks. Try it with hot or cold chicken, lamb, drizzled over oven roast vegetables and with salads; I particularly like it with avocado and tomatoes.
Ingredients
100g watercress, stalks and leaves
50g spinach. thick stalks removed and preferably baby leaves
1 tsp. roasted garlic puree
60g pecorino, grated (or parmesan)
60g pine kernels
150 ml olive oil
Salt and pepper
Method
Wrap a bulb of garlic just as it is, whole and unpeeled, in foil and bake in the oven set at about 180c for 50-60 minutes, then set aside to cool
When cool enough to handle, divide the garlic bulb into cloves and squeeze the contents out of each one onto a saucer. Squash with a fork. You will need about a teaspoonful of the puree for this recipe, but save any left over because it's delicious on toast, added to gravy or a casserole, added to a salad, vegetables or almost anything savoury
Put all the ingredients apart from the olive oil and seasoning into a food processor and whizz until you have a green puree
Add the olive oil a little at a time
Taste an season
Pour into a sterilised pot then carefully float some additional olive oil on the top (which will help to preserve it)
Seal and store in the fridge
Helpful Hints
You can feel fairly relaxed about the temperature of the oven for the garlic, just add on a bit of time is the oven is cooler.
You can make this with raw garlic if you wish, but be very careful with quantity because raw garlic is a bit of a bully and its flavour will overtake the delicate pepperiness of the watercress - and your breath will have that garlic whiff..
