Vegan Basil Pesto

I think its time to introduce you to my favorite little kitchen helper... my Magic Bullet. I'm willing to bet that most of you have seen the infomercials and I'm also willing to bet that at least a couple of you were tempted to buy it. It may not be the miracle that the infomercial portrays it to be, but its always been a big help to me. I mean, I use it to grind my coffee, make smoothies, and as a make shift food processor. Its cheap too. I can't really afford a nice food processor and I don't really have a lot of room for a ton of different appliances, so a magic bullet is convenient for us college-age, tight-budgeted, or small-kitchened cooks. Another thing I love about my personal magic bullet... it was free. I won it at my high-school senior picnic and its still going strong about 3 years later.

Here he is! And notice the outlet converter... yes, I packed my magic bullet and carried it all the way to London.

This is my latest magic bullet creation: Vegan Basil Pesto. It is really good with pasta, or spread on a sandwich, or for anything really.

If you don't have a magic bullet, you can use a food processor obviously. And all though I hate to be disloyal to my little helper, a food processor is probably better because you can better control the consistency and how much you blend everything.

Vegan Basil Pesto

Ingredients

2 cups packed basil leaves

1/4 cup pine nuts

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

juice of 1 whole lemon

4 cloves garlic, chopped

3 tablespoons miso paste

1/2 teaspoon salt

The cast of characters

*if you can't find miso paste or don't want to use it you don't have to, but it adds the flavor that the cheese would have given it in a non-vegan pesto

And once you have all of the ingredients out, it's super easy to prepare. You simply add all of the ingredients into your magic bullet/food processor and blend until its a creamy consistency.

Here's the sauce, all jarred and ready to go. That's one green sauce.

Another note about pesto- the basil can brown when heated so I would add the sauce after everything is cooked and try not to heat it too much. The taste isn't affected but a brownish-greenish sauce just isn't pretty.

pesto tossed with some pasta and topped with dairy-free parmesan and pine nuts