Sweet Pea Pesto with Lemon Ricotta Penne
This past Sunday morning, we went to the local farmers market to pick up some fresh fruits and veggies. Vibrant green towers of sweet peas and pea shoots seemed to overflow from nearly every farm stand. I couldn’t help but fill my bag with these verdant gems. Peas are one of those ingredients that I add to any dish when I want a bit of green and sweetness. They instantly brighten the look and taste.
My oldest kitty, Suey, would most assuredly agree. Anytime I eat something with peas, she’s right by my side, pawing at my hand and gently nudging me with her little gray face. She usually ends up stealing most of the peas from my dish. I’ve wised up over the years and know to add more peas than usual so I can share with her and still have some left for myself.
When I was growing up, my parents were total foodies. There were always stacks of Bon Appétit magazines scattered around the house, many of the pages dogeared to mark various recipes to try. I spent many hours in my youth thumbing through those pages of beautifully photographed food.
One dish in particular that my dad always made was a wonderful bow-tie pasta with snow peas and sweet dried basil. Even to this day, it is still the most requested dish at our family gatherings. It was my inspiration for incorporating English snap peas into this pesto. Basil is plentiful in California right now, but I think it’s much sweeter in the height of summertime. The peas sweeten the basil just a bit.
Vernazza, 2007
The origins of pesto come from the Liguria region of Italy, Genoa to be exact. My husband and I were fortunate enough to be able to visit Liguria. We spent a portion of our honeymoon in the Cinque Terre (Five Lands), just south of Genoa. It’s composed of five enchanting seaside villages once only accessible by sea but now linked together by train, or, more famously, by spectacular hiking trails.
Cinque Terre is more breathtaking in person than it is in photographs. Prior to visiting, we kept a picturesque postcard of Vernazza, one of the five towns, to look forward to our upcoming travels. Once we finally arrived, we lugged our bags up 100 precarious steps to our rental apartment and headed straight towards the harbor. It was just before sunset. I remember getting goosebumps standing at the edge of the Ligurian sea, looking out at the undulating coastline, listening to the thunderous waves crash against the craggy rocks, and telling my husband, “Look, we’re inside the postcard!” It was truly one of the most magical moments in my life.
Basil is rumored to be the sweetest on this stretch of the Italian Riviera. Indeed, we had pesto every day that we were there. We'd spend hours at the tiny cafes savoring every morsel of our food and sipping on the local wine. There are two DOC wines produced in the Cinque Terre - one a dry white simply called Cinque Terre wine (vino delle Cinque Terre) and the other an amber-hued raisin wine called sciacchetrà. Both wines are made from a blend of three grapes: (Bosco, Albarola and Vermentino).
Because many European wine regions have a long history of producing wines that complement the local cuisine, we wanted to pair this pesto with a Cinque Terre wine, a dry light-bodied white with a mineral finish and notable acidity. However, it’s a very difficult wine to find Stateside (unless you order online), so we searched for a Vermentino, since it's one of the three grapes included in that blend. No luck there either.
This led us to select a Grillo instead, a varietal from Sicily that was traditionally used to make Marsala wine, but has gained its own IGT status. I love how a search for wine can lead you down the rabbit hole on a little vinophile's adventure! A dry white with mild acidity, but definitely not as acidic as the Cinque Terre wine, the Grillo is still a nice complement to the myriad flavors going on in this dish. It balances the sweetness of the peas, the herbaceous bite of the basil, the nuttiness of the pine nuts, and marries well with the light creamy acidity of the lemon ricotta.
Whenever Allen, my low-carb-loving husband, chooses to indulge in pasta, it’s usually of a gluten-free variety these days, generally made with either brown rice or soy flour. We really love the Trader Joe’s organic brown rice penne, but you can certainly use traditional pasta as well. The recipe below is gluten-free and vegetarian. However, I added in crunchy prosciutto bits on top for the hunters and fresh pea shoots for the gatherers.
SWEET PEA PESTO WITH LEMON RICOTTA PENNE
Ingredients (serves 4):
2 cups loosely packed fresh basil leaves
1 1/2 cups English snap peas, shelled (about 1 1/4 lbs peas in pods)
1 garlic clove
1/4 cup pine nuts, toasted
1/2 cup freshly grated parmigiano reggiano
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil (plus more for drizzling on top)
1/2 tsp coarsely ground sea salt
1 cup part-skim ricotta cheese
1 lemon, zested
1 lb organic brown rice penne
2 slices prosciutto (optional)
1/4 cup fresh pea shoots (optional)
Directions:
In boiling salted water, cook the shelled peas for 1-2 mins. Drain and rinse immediately with cold water to stop the cooking process. Once peas are cool, combine 1 cup of peas (set aside the other 1/2 cup) with basil, pine nuts and garlic clove in a blender or food processor. Blend until a paste forms - you will likely have to stop blending a few times to push some of the basil leaves down towards the blade. Transfer paste to a bowl and stir in the parmigiano reggiano, salt and olive oil.
Cook pasta in salted boiling water until slightly over al dente (I prefer brown rice pasta a little softer than traditional pasta). Meanwhile, combine the zest of one lemon with the ricotta cheese. Drain pasta, toss with lemon-ricotta mix, sweet pea pesto and reserved peas. Drizzle olive oil and grate fresh cheese over top. Sprinkle crispy prosciutto bits on top for the hunters (bake prosciutto slices at 350° for 10 mins) or garnish with fresh pea shoots for the gatherers. Buon appetito!