Orecchiette, Cilantro Pesto, and Parsley Pesto

Orecchiette with Parsley Pesto

My insomnia has been really bad lately. I mean so bad that I am literally baking and cooking at one-two in the morning, yeah... I have been sleeping about three-four hours a night, tons of fun... Anyways this has led to some really good food if I do say so myself.

As I mentioned a while ago, I've become really interested in making bread products. The first thing that got me into the "bread" making was my gnocchi. This also allowed me to get in touch with my Italian side. I mean, ever since I stopped eating bread and pasta myself, I don't really cook it for the bf, and I actually feel as though part of my nationality is gone. I know, a little strange but that's always been a staple in our house, and I just cut it out completely. At least I live with someone who still enjoys that food.

The other day as I was doing my normal perusing through food blogs I came across a recipe for orecchiette, which in case you don't know translates into "little ears", a little morbid if I do say so myself. I got extremely excited becauuuuse you don't need a pasta machine for this! *Throws hands in the air and starts doing a happy dance! There aren't many pasta recipes that you can make without the machine so I was ecstatic. Well, seeing as I couldn't sleep, this is what I made.

Last night, I then came across a recipe for cilantro pesto, and boy was I happy I found that. Last week when I went to the grocery store I thought I was going to need insane amounts of cilantro for the week (why did I think that? I don't know, but I had a whole bunch of cilantro that was going to go to waste) my food angels spoke to me and allowed me to find this recipe and save my cilantro! So, at 12:30 am I hopped into my little kitchen and started picking the cilantro leaves off their stems and pulsing them in my extremely small food processor. I decided to use the previous recipe as a guideline and sort of did my own thing, so here is what I did.

Ingredients:

• 2 1/3 cup cilantro leaves, packed
• 3 garlic cloves
• Lemon juice from the bottle, about half of a lemon
• Sea salt and Pepper
• Handful of pine nuts
• Slight drizzle of EVOO

Directions:
Throw everything into your food processor, pulse until it looks like a spread.

In my case, I actually ended up using the pesto as a sauce. With that being said, this is what I did for the bf's meal. I cooked the orecchiette on the stove for four minutes. Heated a skillet with butter, through in the pesto, and added some soy milk to make it a little creamy. Added the orecchiette and tossed it around for a minute. Then served.

He really enjoyed it. Said the orecchiette could of probably been cooked a little longer, since I did have them in the freezer, whoops, this is what happens when you can't taste your food. He said the pesto was extremely flavourful. And I mean, the bowl of food was gone in less than ten minutes, as I was in the kitchen I kept hearing the clinks of the fork hitting the bowl and that brought a gigantic smile to my face!

I also decided that since the cilantro pesto was such a hit that I would use up our supply of fresh parsley and make some pesto with that. So here is what I did for the parsley pesto :)

Ingredients:

• 2 cloves garlic
• 2 cups fresh parsley - packed
• Sea salt and pepper
• 1/3 cup EVOO
• 1/2 cup grated Parmesan
  

Directions:
In a food processor place the garlic, parsley, pinch salt, and cheese. Process until they form a paste. Gradually blend in olive oil, taste adjust your seasoning if necessary.

I hope you enjoyed this :)!