Harvesting Herbs: Basil

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This is a great project to let your kiddos help with. My daughter helped me cut all the herbs, then I had her help me pull all the leaves off the stalks. She is only 3, but she saved me a lot of work and had a blast doing it. She keeps asking me “Mommy, when can we cook some herbs again!”.

So… we trimmed all the basil back and with that made 2-3 ice cube trays full of basil pesto. I just doubled the recipe below (per tray, so I actually quadrupled the recipe to get 2.5 trays) and put them in ice cube trays, let them freeze for 24 hours (takes a while w/ the olive oil), then I popped them out with a knife and stored them in freezer bags.

When I want to use some for pasta, pizza or something else, I pull a couple of cubes out and put them into the microwave for about 10-20 seconds and the sauce is ready to use!

Here is the recipe I used:

Basil Pesto

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 garlic clove, peeled
2 cups fresh basil leaves
1/4 cup toasted pine nuts
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/2 cup – 3/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 cup grated Parmesan
** Into the bowl of a food processor, add the garlic, basil leaves, pine nuts, paremesan cheese, salt, and pepper. Pulse until finely chopped. With the blender still running, slowly pour 1/2 cup of olive oil.

TIP: I get my olive oil (I get just olive oil, not extra virgin, I only pay more for extra virgin olive oil if I am using it in a salad dressing), parmesan and pine nuts at Costco in bulk. I freeze what I don’t use of the parmesan and pine nuts and then pull them out for pastas, salads etc later.

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