Adventures in Food Processing

In a post from last week, I mentioned my exciting new purchase of a food processor.  On the very first day I had it I made pesto with the garlic scapes from my share that had been sitting in my refrigerator what felt like forever.  I also used it to make homemade hummus a few days ago (way to save myself money!).  Long story short - FOOD PROCESSORS ARE AWESOME.

Turns out the number of scapes I had made a lot of very powerful pesto.  I was a little surprised at how much flavor they packed since they had been in the fridge for at least 3 weeks.  I even had to trim the tops because they had started to dry up and turn brown.  A little of this pesto goes a LONG way with the wallop of garlic flavor.  It's also a really pretty color green.  It took next to no time to make and doesn't require a lot of ingredients so it's a cheap, delicious way to enhance a simple pasta dish if you're feeling a little broke-ish before your next paycheck hits (that was me this week!).

You'll be very proud to know that neither of the dishes I made with my pesto had a recipe.  I just made them up on my own.  Admittedly, neither of them are particularly brilliant or complex but this was a big step for me and my terror in winging it in the kitchen.  I think it kind of speaks to the flexibility of the pesto.  It's handy to have around and you can throw it together with other random stuff and have something yummy at the end.

Pasta with Roasted Tomatoes, Onions and Pesto

When I think about pesto the first thing that comes to mind is pasta so I figured it would be simple way to take the pesto for a test run.  I decided I'd add some cherry tomatoes to the dish as well and as I was going through share items still hanging around my fridge I realized I still had three onions that I figured I should use before they went bad. 

I sliced the tomatoes in half and thinly sliced the onions, tossed them in some olive oil with pepper, salt and some oregano (dried from my share!), wrapped it all in some tinfoil and popped it in the oven until the tomatoes were tender.

Then I mixed the cooked pasta with the pesto and added in the onion and tomato and had a lovely dinner for myself paired with a salad that had farm fresh lettuce and cucumbers!

Pesto, Ricotta and Tomato Tarts

Back on July 4 I made two different tarts using frozen puff pastry - carrot and ricotta (successful!) and fennel (unsuccessful!).  Well, I bought more puff pastry than I needed and only used a small amount of the ricotta so both of those items have just been hanging around, taking up space.  I decided last night to throw them all together with the pesto and make a little pizza style dish.



I cut the sheet of puff pastry into four squares and, like the previous tarts, folded in the edges to make a little crust around the edges.  I used a fork to puncture the pastry dough so it wouldn't get too puffy and crazy in the oven and spooned a layer of ricotta cheese on top.  I added a little salt and pepper (per the recipe for the carrot tart) on top of the cheese and then added a thin later of pesto - enough to cover the cheese, but not so much that the taste would be overwhelming.  

Note: BOTH of my cats were particularly interested in what I was doing while I was working on the tart crusts, jumping onto the counter and trying to walk all over them. Fortunately, no paws made contact with the dough (though one cat nose did) and as far as I can tell no cat hair seasoned them either.  Silly kitties.

I had half of a large tomato in the fridge so I sliced it as thin as possible while maintaining its shape.  My plan was to just later the tomato on top of the tart as is, but the slices were too wide for the square tart so I cut them in half so they were wedge shaped and layered them to fit.  This is where I took a chance.  I figured I should put a little olive oil on the tomato since any time I've roasted anything in the oven since starting this blog it required a coating of olive oil.  So, I took a pastry brush and lightly applied the oil to the top of the tomato slices. 

I topped everything with a little more crushed black pepper and sea salt and a dash of parmesan cheese and popped it in the oven for 20 minutes.  It smelled AMAZING as it was cooking and I was really excited to taste the finished product.

When I took them out of the oven they looked beautiful (often, my presentation leaves a lot to be desired so I was pretty psyched) and smelled even better.  I resisted the urge to eat one right away and let them cool a little while I did all the dishes.  The tarts were really, really tasty.

    

These tarts would be a great little addition to a house party or gathering.  Small enough to enjoy one without ruining your appetite for a meal.  I still have one sheet of dough and a little more cheese left so I think I'll make another batch tonight.  Yummmm!

Until next time, friends!