Harmony Kitchen

May 9, 2025 Recipe of the Week

Ever have one of those nights when you only have a few minutes to make a meal but still want to serve something healthy and delicious that everyone will love?

Pesto to the rescue!

We have pesto at least once a week and we never get tired of it. It is easy to keep it fresh. You can change up the elements with whatever you happen to have in the fridge at the moment!

Right now, we are enjoying the tail end of ramp season by stocking the freezer with wild ramp pesto. During the growing season, we use whatever is fresh and abundant. This includes garlic scapes, basil, cilantro, fennel, carrot tops, and kale.

Pantry items: Extra Virgin Olive Oil (~1/2 cup) 1/4 Lemon ~1/2 cup parmesan ~1/2 cup pine nuts ~1/2 tsp salt

Method

Start by thawing your package of kale. It is flat pack frozen so thaws quickly, either on the counter or in a sink of water.

While this is thawing, toast your pine nuts. Place them in a dry skillet on medium high heat and keep moving them around so that they don’t burn. Soon they will start to smell delicious and will have a light browning. Remove them from the heat until you need them.

Next, wash and chop the ramps. You don’t need to throw away anything unless there are tough or woody stems. It will be chopped up so tiny that all parts are good to include. Once washed, they can be roughly chopped.

For the lemon, you can use an entire 1/4 lemon wedge. Wash the rind carefully and cut off the pithy ends then cut the wedge in slices. Cut the little edge of membrane at the thin edge of the wedge and remove the seeds.

Place the ramps, salt, lemon slices and about 1/2 of the olive oil in the food processor. Pulse until the ramps are partially chopped then turn the processor on until they are very finely chopped.

Next add the kale and keep processing. You can add olive oil as it chops to keep the mixture a smooth and creamy consistency.

Finally, add the pine nuts and parmesan and do a final run in the processor. Add more oil if you need it to keep the pesto consistency nice and creamy, like soft serve ice cream.

Pause and taste the pesto. Add a bit more salt or some pepper if you need it.

That’s it! Serve it right away with some pasta or put it in a jar with a bit of olive oil over the top to keep it from oxidizing. It will keep well in the fridge for pasta or sandwiches later in the week or you can pop it in the freezer and have it on a day when you have even less time:).

The great thing about this recipe? You can modify it in so many ways. Just keep the main elements and basic proportions and it is bound to be delicious. You can swap out the ramps for other delicious greens or herbs. Make sure to add a bit of raw garlic if you are not using ramps. You can change the nuts to walnuts, cashews, pepitas or almonds (or likely many more, those are just the ones I have tried!). You can even swap out the cheese if you want to get really fancy (or if you find yourself looking in your fridge like a deer in the headlights with no parm but some nice looking feta).

Time Savers, Storage Tips and Spin off Recipes

• This is one of the kids’ favourites for left over lunches. Make some extra pesto pasta and package it up to microwave the next day.
• Pesto is also great instead of (or with) tomato sauce in lasagne
• We LOVE pesto as a base for pizza toppings.
• Pesto is a fantastic addition to any type of sandwich, especially grilled cheese.

Did you Know?

Frozen vegetables generally have similar nutritional profiles to fresh vegetables. Freezing preserves most of the nutrients. Because they have been harvested and preserved at their peak freshness, they often retain more nutrients than items that have been sitting in the fridge.

This Recipe’s Plant Count: Five, in addition to whatever you are serving the pesto on

Time Required: ~10 minutes, just enough time to boil some pasta!

Number of Servings: Dinner for four people, with leftovers