Baked Garlic Pesto

I love Pesto and would drizzle it on everything. Recently I have discovered that by roasting my garlic it makes the Pesto softer. It is great to have a dose of raw garlic, particularly in the winter when colds are rife, but I am currently stuck on just roasting a big bulb of garlic and keeping it in the fridge so I can squeeze out the cloves whenever I take a notion to. Often just to spread on something and scoff as I go.

Serves 4 as nibbles with drinks

Ingredients

1 clove of garlic from a bulb of roasted garlic
Handful of pine nuts (my hands are quiet small but I have established one of my handfuls is about 1/4 a cup)
1 grow your own basil plant from the supermarket
Handful of finely grated parmesan cheese
Coarse sea salt/Maldon Salt/Himalayan Salt
Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Method

1. Roast your bulb of garlic, slice off the top drizzle with Olive oil and bake wrapped up in tin foil for around 30 minutes. I know mine is ready when I give it a squeeze and it squelches.

2. Toast your pine nuts in a dry frying pan for about 3 mins, don’t let them catch and burn so keep your eye on them
3. Roughly chop all of the basil. I then use a hand mixer to mix up the basil with the garlic, though you can use a pestle and mortar
4. Add in the pine nuts and most of the Parmesan mix or pound again
5. Sprinkle with salt and drizzle in a table spoon of olive oil
6. Mix and taste
7. Continue until you get the seasoning and consistency you like I like mine quite chunky for this but you may like yours more creamy