Loot: Week 3 and How All These Weeks Are Running Together

This week at the farm stand we found more turnips, carrots, zucchini, summer squash, basil, more peas, lettuce, kale, and shallots.

You may have noticed that in the pesto pasta dish yesterday, there was fresh basil. Where did the basil come from, you may ask. It came from our week 3 loot. There are two possible explanations for this. One is that we're time-traveling vegetable-eaters, hopping week to week all summer to find the best ingredients for our favorite recipes. This is the cooler explanation, and the one I would prefer you believe.

The other explanation is that we're posting a couple of weeks after we are getting, cooking, and eating all these vegetables. And that some weeks, take-out sounds really good, so the vegetables are waiting (patiently, of course, because everyone knows that vegetables are patient) for us to get to them. Which gives rise to interesting combinations of vegetables that wouldn't be otherwise possible (you know, unless we went to the store and actually bought them).

For example, the garlic scapes from week 2 were photographed, mentioned in the loot post, and never discussed again. You'll see them pop up again in week 4, in a very tasty dish along with the shallots and summer squash from this week, and more garlic scapes and summer squash we have yet to get in week 4. So there you have it. Time-traveling vegetables.

Pesto Pasta

When I realized that we had both fresh basil and peas in the house, I got very excited. One of my absolute favorite recipes, what I like to call Pesto Pasta, calls for both of those. Plus other personal favorites spinach and pine nuts. Also exciting? Fresh peas are delicious.

This recipe is one of my all-time favorites for a lot of reasons. It packs a flavorful punch, it can be eaten hot or cold, and, loaded with spinach, peas, and pine nuts, it's a pretty healthy, but filling dish. In addition, it's easy to tweak the ingredients as you like, or to scale up the recipe and make a whole vat. Then you get to eat it, hot or cold, all week.

If you're wondering where the fresh basil came from, I'll tell you tomorrow.

I mean just look at this beautiful dish:

Pesto Pasta

Ingredients:
basil
pine nuts
salt
pepper
olive oil
noodles (we usually use bow-tie)
spinach
peas
mayonnaise - about half as much as you have pesto
lemon juice - maybe a tablespoon

Steps:
1. Make the pesto - combine basil, pine nuts, salt, pepper, and olive oil in food processor or blender, blend until you have a fine thick liquid
2. Cook pasta
3. While cooking pasta, combine pesto, mayonnaise, lemon juice, and a little more salt and pepper
4. Cook peas and wilt spinach, and, if you love pine nuts as much as I do, you can add more whole nuts here
5. Combine in a large bowl pasta, peas and spinach, and pesto mayonnaise sauce
6. Serve hot or cold - it's great both ways!

Update:
After an ill-fated joyride and the heroic efforts of search and rescue teams, the photo of the pesto pasta has been safely recovered: