Hello, foodie friends!
My carrot harvest has been blowin’ up!
(Image 1)
As you can see, my cat crop is also in full swing.
(Image 2)
But what to do with all the greens? Even though I have a two square foot patch of carrots growing, there are drastically more greens than carrots. Chopping them off and throwing them away seemed wasteful, especially since I cared for and toiled over these beauties for months. I wanted to make sure I used “every part of the horse”. So, I remembered this article I had heard from chef Diane Morgan on the NPR program “The Splendid Table” about different ways to use the greens. As soon as I heard the word pesto, I was sold.
Having none of the necessary supplies on hand, I decided to forego the recipe, but use the idea to create my own from what I had around. The ingredients are as follows:
Carrot Green Pesto:
10 cups carrot leaves, washed throughly and detached from center stems (it seems like a lot, but will blend down to nothing)
3/4 cup marinated artichoke hearts in their juices (the kind that comes in a jar)
3 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
1/2 cup coconut oil
1/2 cup vegetable oil
3 Tbsp coarse ground sea salt
1 Tbsp white pepper
Pinch of red pepper flake
1/4 cup toasted sesame seeds
1/2 cup parmesan cheese, grated.
Start by toasting the sesame seeds in a cold, dry skillet. Dump ‘em in and put it on medium heat. Give it a few tosses while its cooking. Take them off the heat when they’re toasty, brown, and fragrant. Should take about 5 minutes. Set aside.
Now, Put the artichoke hearts, garlic, sea salt, pepper, and red pepper flake in a food processor and pulse until combined. Then, shove the carrot greens in there. Put the food processor on (I have three settings on mine– pulse, on and off. If you have “high” on yours, do it on that). Slowly, pour the oils in through the spout on top of the food processor until everything looks pretty creamy,. Then pulse in the sesame seeds. Follow it up by pulsing in the parmesan.
It will look delicious at this point. Sort of like this:
(Image 3)
I was worried about making this recipe because I didn’t have any walnuts or pine nuts on hand, but honestly– the artichokes, the sesame seeds, the coconut oil– it was all too perfect
I ate this stuff on some pasta and with the roasted carrots these greens came from. It was perfect. The next day, I used it as a spread for a grilled cheese with on sourdough with aged gouda (hnnnghhhhh). Really, seriously, I can’t wait to make more!
Foodie Friend
--Mia Scioscia