It's garlic scape season, my most favourite of summer vegetables. The delicious curling flower shoot of the garlic plant are at their peak right now. We have garlic growing in our community garden plot and this afternoon I harvested eighteen scapes. I had completely forgotten to get them from our own garden and have bought them the past two weekends at farmer's markets.
We've been having them steamed in salads, but tonight I wanted to try something new.
Garlic Scape Pesto with Walnuts and Grilled Lemon
makes approx 2 cups of pesto
2 cups chopped garlic scapes, the top flower portion removed and any tough stalky bit at the bottom cut off
1 cup fresh arugula (optional)
1 cup toasted walnuts
1/2 cup grated hard cheese (I used asiago, but parmesan would be great too)
1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 water
1 tsp salt
juice of a grilled lemon (you can use a plain lemon, but if you use a grilled one the flavour is sweeter and you'll get twice as much juice)
Steam the garlic scapes for a minute and a half and then rinse well with cold water. You can use raw scapes but the garlic flavour will be very strong.
Put everything into a food processor and blend well, you may need a little extra olive oil or water to thin it out a bit.
I froze half in a ziplock bag to save for later and will still have heaps for the next week or so.
We had ours with a mixed plate of grilled chicken, carrots (I LOVE grilled carrots!), peppers and lemon.
Also delicious on steamed potatoes, pasta, halloumi, on a sandwich . . .
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