The scorching heat – daily temperatures over 40 C (well over 100 F ) – blistering central and southern Italy for all July and much of August has broiled our vegetable garden. Some tomatoes gamely survive but salad, beans, peppers, eggplants, onions, cucumbers, celery and even the parsley, have all succumbed. Even the massive centuries-old oaks on our hills are drying up.
Our basil – in a large pot near the kitchen – receives more water and though not the abundance of past years, the herb survives.
I carried out the blue plastic bucket of water now: this stays near our sink and all water from the rinsing of vegetables goes here, for the watering of the pots near the house. The sultry still air is churned today by a hot breeze, that scirocco blowing in from the Sahara, like a giant hair dryer. No relief at all.
I’d decided to bring in a handful of basil to create a simple quick, no-cook sauce for the pasta (after all, it may be torrid but pasta’s not missing at lunchtime). I was thinking on the “pesto” theme but did not want to get out the blender, nor take down our heavy mortar and pestle (made in the Assisi pink limestone by a local mason), essential to pesto-making.
I’d decided to finely dice the basil this round rather than pulverize it….
….and I did want to incorporate Pino’s aged goat cheese. The result? See below:
Pesto con il Caprino di Pino
Ingredients (for 2 – 4)
- a couple generous handfuls of fresh basil (or more!)
- 2 garlic cloves
- a handful of pine nuts
- Extra virigin olive oil, q. b. (“quanto pasta” or “ as much as you need”)
- salt q. b.
- caprino cheese, q.b. (or use your favorite grated cheese if you do not have a goat cheese made by Pino!)
- pasta – spaghetti or pasta of your choice (you can guess amount, considering that 1 lb is for 5 persons)
Wash basil, dry, then dice finely – and I use our treasured cradle knife for this, called mezzaluna ( “half-moon”) in Italian. Add the two garlic cloves, chopped and dice with the basil:
When basil and garlic cloves are diced quite a bit, add pine nuts and dice all:
When pine nuts, garlic, basil are all finely-diced, add olive oil and a bit of salt (but…attenzione!…. the cheese you will use will be salty, too….):
Choose pasta you will use (I used the Umbrian strozzapreti, small twists of flour, water) and cook in generous amount of salted boiling water.
While pasta is boiling, prepare the cheese you will use – can be grated or even diced into small pieces, as I preferred to do with Pino’s caprino.
[lcaption]Caprino di Pino before dicing finely[/lcaption]
Drain pasta and mix in the pesto mixture, setting aside some of the mixture to add after you stir in the cheese.
[lcaption]Some Pesto stirred in but cheese to be added[/lcaption]
Add diced cheese:
Add the remaining pesto sauce and serve….buon appetito!
A hot-day culinary improvisation, but it passed the test for Pino:
Read about Pino’s caprino
Read about the pesto genovese here
Click here for the pesto genovese recipe
Click for the Sicilian pistachio pesto recipe
Click here for more recipes
Click here for another recipe using our mezzaluna
Perfect idea!
I did a similar dish recently with the mint that is so abundant in my new Oregon home. Adding fresh peas and some feta (because we don’t have Pino’s goat cheese) to the pasta — yum! Here’s to making the best of the sizzling summer.
This dish is my absolute favorite when in Italy. Even a vegan needs some true Italian pesto once in awhile! I like the idea of the mezzaluna instead of the food processor.