Stinging Nettle Pesto
Description
Stinging nettles are a nourishing and delicious green food. They're also free! Make sure you wear gloves when you harvest them, and only take nettles in spring, when the plants are two feet high at the most. Older nettles are best left on the plant and raided later for seeds. Sometimes our nettles come back in the fall, so I take the tops off enough of them to make another small batch of pesto, or a soup. You'll want to harvest the top tiers of leaves, so just cut off the top 6-8 inches. I use a nippers.
Shake your nettles. This gets rid of aphids and caterpillars. You can also spray your nettles with water.
Ingredients
Instructions
Prepare Your Nettles
Wearing gloves, pull the leaves off the stems and wash them well. Save the stems for making a wonderful fertilizer tea (see note). Check carefully for caterpillars and aphids.
Bring a large stockpot full of water to boiling, and add the nettles to the pot. After 30 seconds, scoop out the nettles and put them in a bowl full of ice cold water. Turn off the heat under the pot of water.
From now on you don't need gloves. This step must not be skipped! Blanching the nettles is what destroys the stingers, and if you don't blanch them, your pesto will be inedible. If you've ever been stung, you can imagine that feeling in your mouth!
Assemble Your Pesto
Drain the nettles and put them in a cuisinart, along with the garlic, lemon juice, and olive oil.
Meanwhile, roast your nuts/seeds. I do this by putting them dry in a sauté pan and heating them on low heat. Stir constantly. As soon as they start changing color, remove them from the heat and let them cool a bit. Add them to the cuisinart and blend your pesto. Add a little salt and pepper and blend again for a few seconds. Take a taste test. Does it need more lemon? More garlic? Salt? Nuts? Add what you think it needs and blend it in. Now put your pesto in little jars. I use old jam spice jars, any jar will do as long as it has a lid and isn't too big. I use small jars because I don't need a large amount of pesto at one time, and I don't want the unfinished jar to go bad in the fridge.
Leave a little head space in your jars, cover, label, and freeze them. That's it! When I need to make pesto, I just defrost a jar, put the pesto with a squirt of olive oil in a serving bowl, and boil up some pasta. When the pasta is done, drain it and put the hot noodles in the bowl with the pesto right away. Let this stand for a couple of minutes, then mix and serve.
I never add cheese to mine, but my family does, so I grate some parmesan cheese and set it out in a bowl.
Note
You can make an excellent fertilizer tea from the unused nettle stems. It's so easy: put them in a jar and cover them with hot water. Let this stand for a few days, then remove the stems and use the water on your plants. I don't water them deeply with it, just give them a cup or so. I do this with both indoor and outdoor plants.
And don't forget that blanching liquid! After cooling it down, use it the same way as the stem water.
Your plants will appreciate it.
