My mom brought home a lot of pasta from the States. Now is my chance to experiment on cooking European pasta. I even used the pasta for my birthday party with family last August. I also tried to infuse European pasta with Thai recipe using Pinoy ingredients and I came up with Pinoy Pad-Thai. I think that was a successful infusion because they finish a large serving platter in an hour.
I focused on tomato-based sauces as I was avoiding the use of creams. Then I was running out of tomato-based ideas so I focused on olive oil-based sauces. Good thing mom also brought a liter home. I can no longer avoid pesto.
I tasted pesto pasta at Long Island, a popular pasta stall at school. It was not bad at all. So pesto is basically made out of basil leaves and olive oil. Now where could I buy basil? First, I thought dried laurel is the same as basil. I crushed dried laurel leaves and proceeded. It was a total failure. It tasted so bitter with no way of salvation. Second, I tried crushed basil. The ones in shakers like at Sbarro. Still bitter.
I would really need to find fresh basil leaves. A few days later, it is sale at S&R. I finally had fresh basil plus some other ingredients like grated parmesan and crushed chili. I tried cooking again and was happy I finally made pesto pasta!
Now, the basil leaves are used up and the curiosity in me is asking for a more readily available alternative. The first thing that came to mind is the crackers-like taste and texture of sili leaves that I tried to deep-fry from the Tinola that mom cooked. (Please try that one too) Could sili leaves possibly be an alternative to basil in pesto pasta?
I focused on tomato-based sauces as I was avoiding the use of creams. Then I was running out of tomato-based ideas so I focused on olive oil-based sauces. Good thing mom also brought a liter home. I can no longer avoid pesto.
I tasted pesto pasta at Long Island, a popular pasta stall at school. It was not bad at all. So pesto is basically made out of basil leaves and olive oil. Now where could I buy basil? First, I thought dried laurel is the same as basil. I crushed dried laurel leaves and proceeded. It was a total failure. It tasted so bitter with no way of salvation. Second, I tried crushed basil. The ones in shakers like at Sbarro. Still bitter.
I would really need to find fresh basil leaves. A few days later, it is sale at S&R. I finally had fresh basil plus some other ingredients like grated parmesan and crushed chili. I tried cooking again and was happy I finally made pesto pasta!
Now, the basil leaves are used up and the curiosity in me is asking for a more readily available alternative. The first thing that came to mind is the crackers-like taste and texture of sili leaves that I tried to deep-fry from the Tinola that mom cooked. (Please try that one too) Could sili leaves possibly be an alternative to basil in pesto pasta?
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