Sun Blushed Tomato Tapenade & Walnut & Olive Pesto?
Sun Blushed Tomato Tapenade & Walnut & Olive Pesto?
Got to love a few side dishes when it’s eating outside time, right?
I’m a sucker for homemade versions of a tapenade and pesto especially now I’m into growing my own herbs.
I say my versions because I’m sure that what I make aren’t technically true to the original recipes of either.
A true tapenade is a specific term for a puree made of olives, capers and anchovies.
Popular in the South of France as a topping for hors d’oeuvres or even as a stuffing for poultry.
Pesto is a sauce traditionally with crushed garlic, pine nuts, basil leaves and a hard cheese such as parmesan cheese, all mixed together with some good olive oil.
Yum, right?
When I make mine, I’m a little less about the exact recipe and more about what I’ve got to hand.
No surprise there if you read any of my other recipes.
As an advocate of jumping into making rather than fretting about what I’ve not got in my pantry, I’d rather make something that is tasty and can be shared than spend all my morning hunting that forgotten ingredient in my local Aldi or Lidl, I think that straying from traditional recipes is the way it should be.
This weekend was a weekend of outside eating, family and friends, so I enjoyed rustling up some salads with a few extra bits on the side.
I did cheat this weekend, making the same meal two days in a row.
I figured I could get away with it because different people were coming to enjoy the sun each day.
I did make changes to the salads and the sides, but essentially a chicken was spatchcocked and arranged around what I had, but I think that I can get away with it with a couple of tasty pesto and tapenades to add to the plates.
The great thing about being able to throw one of these together is simply that, they’re easy to throw together and go with so many things.
For the tapenade, where there should have been capers and anchovies, I used some great green olives, added some juicy sun blushed tomatoes and finished it off with a good squeeze of lime juice.
As a lover of walnuts, trying to fit them into dishes whichever ways I can, I use these in my pestos instead of the expected pine nuts.
As another oily nut, they are a great replacement to pine nuts in other dishes too.
Another change are the herbs. I think that’s fresh basil is beautiful herb, and definitely right for both the pesto and tapenade, but it’s great to add other fresh herbs too just to give it a bit more umph.
Now if you’re a purist, go ahead and stick to the letter of the law, find a recipe for a tapenade or pesto that suits you, or you can be like me and wing it with what you’ve got, and as long as it’s in the theme, call it what you want.
No one will care, because let’s face it, no one will know the difference if it tastes this good.
Go on, give these a try, and enjoy your sweet life.
Sun Blushed Tomato Tapenade
Keep texture in the tapenade
A recipe with no measurements.
What You Need
Sun Blushed Tomatoes – See Tip Box
Bunch of Fresh Basil
2 Cloves of Garlic
Green Olives – See Tip Box
1 Lime - Juice
Olive Oil – See Tip Box
Malden Salt – Pinch – See Tip Box
It only needs a handful of ingredients to make a great taste.
How It’s Done
Place everything into a food processor (except the olive oil)
Process everything until it becomes a rough thick paste
While still running, slowly drizzle olive oil into the mix until it becomes a soft luscious paste with texture
Place the pesto into a serving bowl to serve
Tip Box
Blending - When blending all of the ingredients, don’t overdo it. The finished mix should have a texture and not be a smooth paste.
Taste - Don’t forget to taste
Salt – Because the olives can be salty its best to taste before adding the salt.
Olive Oil – Pour in the olive oil slowly. There is a fine line between the tapenade having a creamy texture and just swimming in oil.
Walnut & Olive Pesto
Fresh, tasty and goes with everything
A recipe with no measurements.
What You Need
Parmesan Cheese
Walnuts – See Tip Box
Fresh Basil
Fresh Parsley
Lime – Juice
Olive Oil - See Tip Box
Malden Salt - Pinch
A bowl of taste
How It’s Done
Place everything into a food processor (except the olive oil)
Process everything until it becomes a rough thick paste
While still running, slowly drizzle olive oil into the mix until it becomes a soft luscious paste with texture
Place the pesto into a serving bowl to serve
Tip Box
Blending - When blending all of the ingredients, don’t overdo it. The finished mix should have a texture and not be a smooth paste.
Taste - Don’t forget to taste
Olive Oil – Pour in the olive oil slowly. There is a fine line between the tapenade having a creamy texture and just swimming in oil.
Walnuts – If you want to use pine nuts instead of the walnuts, that’s the traditional ingredient for a pesto. If making the change to a different nut, try to keep it to an oily nut.
Why choose one when i can have both
