Last Updated on June 22, 2021 by HodgePodgeDays
Each spring the woodland footpaths here abouts are fringed with wild garlic. I often pick a handful of leaves on my morning dog walks. Sometimes if I’ve got some time on my hands, I’ll pick enough to make a jar of wild garlic pesto. It’s a pretty simple thing to make and it stores well in the fridge. It’s also excellent to use in all kinds of dishes, not just your standard pasta with pesto.
I have all kinds of kitchen gadgets, but for pesto for some reason (I think possibly because it’s usually a small quantity) I use my nutribullet to whizz it all up. I like to add some fresh parsley to my pesto, I just really like parsley. You can leave it out if you prefer.
Easy Wild Garlic Pesto
Ingredients
200g wild garlic leaves, washed
50g fresh parsley, roughly chopped
50g parmesan, finely grated
1 garlic clove, finely chopped or grated
½ lemon, zested and juiced
50g pine nuts or walnuts, toasted
200ml good olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste
To make your wild garlic pesto:
Rinse and roughly chop your wild garlic leaves. Put all the wild garlic, parsley, parmesan, garlic, lemon zest and juice and the toasted nuts in your blender or nutribullet, add the oil a bit at a time and whizz it all up until it’s chopped up and combined. Don’t use all of the oil, you’ll need a tablespoon or two for the top of the pesto.
Taste the pesto and season to taste, feel free to add a bit more lemon juice if you feel it needs it. I felt like I added a lot more salt than I imagined I’d need to, so don’t feel you need to be too frugal with the salt shaker.
Pour the wild garlic pesto into a clean jar and top with the remaining oil. The pesto will need to be used fairly quickly, ideally within two weeks.
If you enjoyed this, you might also like to try these wild garlic pesto twists, wild garlic focaccia or these wild garlic and cheese scones.
