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07/23/2020 12:01 AMI am amazed how much friends have managed to get tasks done during this pandemic isolation. My friends the Fitzgeralds’ garden looks like something out of a French painting, with pots of herbs on the fence, homemade cushions with seating for friends, and two gorgeous cocker spaniels lazing on my legs, adding to the ambiance. The Robertsons’ grass looks like a golf course, their bird feeders attended by hovering mamas feeding fledglings. Even my condos are so full of perennials they are about to spill onto the sidewalks.
I seem to do less housecleaning and more reading, cooking, and watching television. The house is clean (the kitchen always pristine), but the clutter gets to me. I do put the bills where they need to be, so I can pay them, and I get rid of junk mail quickly and take it and newspapers to the Dumpster, but the magazines I put in neat piles and sometimes forget to read them.
Such was the case with the May/June issue of Yankee, which probably arrived in April. I love Yankee, especially its columnists. I have known Amy Traverso, its senior food editor, for a long time and her articles and recipes are really good. In that issue, she writes about The Blue Oar in Haddam, our part of the shoreline. And in another she has a recipe for strawberry shortcake, with the shortcake made with pistachios. Obviously, local strawberries are gone, but I will use the shortcake recipe, which uses heavy cream instead of butter, making the recipe easier to make.
Another piece is about Krista Kern Desjarlais and her two restaurants in Maine. You may remember her from her restaurant in Westerly called Three Fish. Decades ago she was serving pastries that were not only delicious but picture perfect. I wrote about her then and have followed her ever since. I ate at her Portland, Maine, tiny restaurant, Bresca, a few times and loved everything about it.
In the magazine, she included a recipe for Pistachio Pesto. I make basil pesto every summer, package about two big tablespoons in plastic snack-sized bags, and freeze the packages separated by paper towels and the little ones into a bigger plastic bag. (The paper towels allow you can separate the snack packs one at a time. You can warm the packets in your hands and they are warm by the time your pasta has boiled and drained.)
To make pesto, you can use any herb for the sauce, and if you are out of pine nuts (which are pretty expensive and difficult to fine), use walnuts. Krista suggests pistachios. I’d never thought of that. Use this recipe and, this summer, use a choice of almost any herb you have and any nuts available. In addition to cooking pasta with pesto, use it in marinara or most other red sauce or in stew this winter, especially if you make pesto out of parsley. Krista also uses a tablespoon each of lemon zest and lemon juice and a little shallot. All this sounds delicious, doesn’t it?
Lee White of Old Lyme has been a food editor and restaurant reviewer for more than 25 years. You can email her at leeawhite@aol.com.
Pesto alla Genovese
(from 365 Ways to Cook Pasta by Marie Simmons, Harper Collins, New York, 1988)
I triple or quadruple (or more) and freeze pesto in small zipper plastic bags. The pesto will last for more than a year and will thaw in minutes.
Yield: 1 cup or enough for 1 pound of pasta
2 cups packed fresh basil leaves
⅓ cup pignoli (pine nuts)
1 large garlic clove, chopped
¼ teaspoon salt
½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
⅓ cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
Finely chop basil, nuts, garlic, and salt in a food processor. With processor still running, add oil in a slow, steady stream through the feed tube until mixture is thoroughly blended. Transfer to a bowl and fold in the cheese.
Freeze in tiny freezer bags. When ready to use, you can thaw the pesto in freezer bag between your two hands.
*Pine nuts are very expensive but worth it. However, walnuts can be used. The flavor will be different but still tasty.