Garlic Scape Pistachio Pesto Hummus

Garlic scapes, basil, parsley and pistachios combined in a traditional hummus base for a fresh Spring dip. Garlic scape pesto freezes to have this seasonal treat year round.

For other recipes using Garlic Scapes, please see my Garlic & Garlic Scapes Recipe Collection. It's part of the Visual Recipe Index by Ingredient, a resource for seasonal eaters faced with a staggering amount of fresh produce we just don't know what to do with. I've got a Pinterest board of Garlic Scape Recipes here, and a Round Up of 28+ Food Blogger Recipes Using Garlic Scapes here. Want to know how to Use This Blog?

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Part One: The Making of Garlic Scape Pesto

To paraphrase Dick Van Dyke's Caractacus Potts in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang ("Don't waste your pucker on some all day sucker.  And don't try a toffee or cream.  If you seek perfection in sugar confection, well, there's something new on the scene") don't waste your scapes in some Spring stir fry, instead try this pesto, it's green.

When I read Annie's post about garlic scape pesto I was intrigued.  I'd never tried it, but it sounded good.  When my CSA farm share and my garlic bed provided me with garlic scapes I knew I'd give it a try.  As it turned out, I didn't follow my own directions for stocking up on pesto supplies before the garlic scapes appeared.  I did have a block of parmesan, but I didn't have any pine nuts.

I got to thinking . . . why do I have to use pine nuts in pesto?  Weren't the original pesto makers just using what was readily available to them, not sourcing to China to make a sauce? (Check your bag of pine nuts, you'd be surprised)  I mean, I had great success using almonds and cashews in my Fresh Tomato Pesto.  In my pantry I've got almonds, walnuts, pistachios, and sunflower seeds available--I chose pistachios for this just because they are green and would enhance the bright green of this garlic scape pesto.

[In fact, I had a lil' ol' pestopalooza party with all the garlic scapes and fresh herbs after my Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm share resumed--that flood of green after the long winter was so welcome--sure, the Strategic Winter Squash Reserve provided some lovely orange veggies, but man, I missed getting a big ol' box of leafy veggies each week!  I made pesto using garlic scapes and sun dried tomatoes.  I used basil and parsley for the leaves. I used pistachios and sunflower seeds for the nuts.  I wrote down the various combinations, but my favorite is the one I'm sharing below--garlic scapes with pistachio nuts and basil.]

Because I plan ahead, and will be putting up this pesto by freezing it, I keep it a little thicker by using less oil.  By freezing this pesto, the plant cell walls that weren't disrupted by the food processor will burst, resulting in a more liquid pesto when thawed.  If you're not planning on saving some for later, use more oil.

{HNTM} Lou Malnati's Chicago Classic Deep Dish Pizza

{How Not to Make} Lou Malnati's Chicago Classic Deep Dish Pizza, packed with sausage and cheese and flavorful tomato sauce.

Don't worry, like the trashy romance novels I adore, there is a happy ending [and a viable recipe] at the end of this post.  But when you find yourself saying 

"once I drained the pizza, it tasted pretty good"

you know there's a story worth sharing.

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Once upon a time [actually last month] a family traveled to Chicago for a short vacation. The dad planned out the route, the lodging, and the sights to see.  The mom prepared what to eat en route, arranged for the dogs to spend their first nights away from the family at a loving kennel, and scouted pizza places to try Chicago's famous deep dish style pizza.  [The kids grumbled about not spending a week lying on the couch staring at screens.]

Forgetting that pesky time zone thing, we arrived early enough to walk/roll around the downtown area, and especially to walk to the first pizza place on The List:  Lou Malnati's.  We ordered a Chicago Classic and a Lou. When they arrived, I took some mental notes:

• The crust is not puffy, not like a yeasted dough that's allowed to rise at the edges.  It's not like Zebra Room flaky pie crust either. It's crispy/crunchy . . . maybe cornmeal?
• The sausage was undisturbed until I cut through it with my fork--it was in a disc the size of the pizza pan, and without browned edges--I think it was placed raw on the pizza and cooked during the pizza baking time.
• The tomatoes don't look like tomato sauce--they look more like my canned crushed tomatoes.  The juice is clear, not cloudy like in a cooked sauce with tomato paste.

And the taste?  Delicious!  Must re-create at home.

With a basic idea in mind I set out to make a deep dish pizza.  My previous attempt at a deep dish pizza ended in a spectacularly inedible failure, shown on my FB page, when I attempted to cram way too much Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm share spinach into the pizza.  But that merely tasted terrible.

My first attempt at a pizza similar to Lou Malnati's Chicago Classic involved grabbing a ball of previously fresh mozzarella out of the freezer.  Now, I know that using thawed balls of mozzarella results in a seedy pizza.  I've commented here about the phenomenon. However, I didn't heed my own advice.  First Big Mistake.

I also scooped out the crushed tomatoes using a slotted spoon, which meant that the tomatoes were already pretty juicy when they went onto the pizza. You know the heat of the oven is going to denature the proteins in the plant cell walls, causing them to burst and release more fluid--so that was my Second Big Mistake.

With those two mistakes synergizing in my skillet, it's no wonder why it happened. When I pulled the skillet out, the pizza looked great--if a little jiggly.  The cheese was browned, the sausage cooked and the crust was crisp--what you want in a pizza.

Then I tried to extricate the pizza, and a tsunami of fluid swarmed out--over the skillet, the counter, the cooling rack, and into the sink [everywhere but where the dogs could reach--they were disappointed]. Thus leading me to the comment.

"once I drained the pizza, it tasted pretty good"

Wild Violet Granola (On Mothers and Mentors)

Nutty crunchy granola, sweetened with wild violet sugar and wild violet syrup, is a tasty breakfast or bedtime snack.  The mothering/mentoring part is just bonus.

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Mentors are a lot like Mothers.

Both mentors and mothers nurture their protégées.  They provide support--practical, physical, and emotional support.  They want to see their charges succeed.  Mentors gently correct mistakes and provide honest feedback.  Mothers do as well [even if it exasperates us to provide the same feed back again and again].  While I don't think I am exactly friends with my own children, I do consider my mentors to be my friends.

My friend and mentor Meghan is to blame responsible for this recipe.  She handed me a bag of her Basic Granola when we met.  I brought it home and was blown away by the chunks, the tender nuts, and the amazing flavor. [And I'd been pretty happy with the Trader Joes granola I'd eat with kefir whenever the mood struck.]

Granola and kefir?  I got into that tasty combination after spending a lovely weekend with my mom and her college buddies and their daughters. The weekend was hosted by my friend and mentor Alanna, and I hope we honored her mom's memory. We sure did it up right.

My own mom continues to be an excellent mentor.  My attitude towards leftovers I learned from her.  Not being afraid of canning the summer harvest? Learned at my mom's shoulder.  Now she's showing me how to age gracefully. Watching my folks pro-actively move to a more supported living arrangement is something I've observed since they moved out of the big suburban house into a city condo the summer I graduated from high school.

What do these three women have to do with the recipe I'm sharing today? Let me braid the strands together. Meghan got me interested in making homemade granola.  My mom taught me to use what I had on hand to create new meals. Alanna has been mentoring my blogging since I first emailed her saying 'I'm thinking of starting a CSA blog' . . . later she told me about the 30 Days to Better Food Photography course I finished a year ago which has helped me improve my images.
We eat first with our eyes, if we are fortunate enough to see, and since I can't have you reach through the screen to sample this granola the least I can do is make it look appealing.

For other recipes using wild violets, please see my Wild Violet Recipes Collection. It's a part of the Visual Recipe Index by Ingredient, a resource for folks like me eating from the front yard, the farm share, the farmer's market, the garden, the neighbor's garden, and great deals on ugly produce at the grocery store.

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