Marilyn Haggerty's amazing Olive Garden review and the subsequent viral shitstorm

Making pesto is easy! Basil, pine nuts, olive oil, blender.Unscrew jar. Takes five minutesseconds at most.

unless i drop the jar which has happened ;_;

some cursory googling leads me to believe I need to finagle a business trip to the UK around Pancake Day

xp: omg lex you are killing me

Sounds like someone should compile an ILX cookbook.

Making pesto is easy! Basil, pine nuts, olive oil, blender. Takes five minutes at most.

― Ned Raggett, Wednesday, March 14, 2012 3:07 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

somehow this would with lex running screaming from a building engulfed in fire, with pine nuts being projected from it at 180 MPH.

would END

Store-bought pesto is unworthy bullshit.

might want to put some salt/pepper in that Ned

True but I've cut back on salt a lot since the high blood pressure kicked in, so...

ALL of my housemates own store-bought pesto. and two of them are really good cooks who love it and do it regularly.

That somehow led to an image of Lex's housemates being Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsay.

I think Jamie Oliver has better taste than to do it with Gordon Ramsay.

there is really nothing in the world like fresh fluffy pesto

nothing

Now I'm imagining dry cotton ball pesto.

is lex mr. bean

I was gonna say, "fluffy" is not generally an adjective that comes to mind when I am trying to describe the consistency of pesto

Little fluffy pestos

would watch Food Network "Lex vs. Food" TV show

or alternately read a series of kids' books (Lex and the Case of the Exploding Hard-Boiled Egg, etc.)

pesto comes out of JARS.

i really don't want to continue this aghast @ lex thing but this is the first thing he has said that is actually depressing to me.

drop him by helicopter into a kitchen and make him cook an omelette.

Lex Pretend and the No Good, Horrible, Very Bad Pancake.

there's some fantastic pestos out there that are in tubes

yeah it's not that i'm some fresh pesto nazi or anything (far from it) but more like the lack of imagination and curiosity he seems to be expressing.

Crest Pesto-paste

I guess I am a pesto purist -- I don't even like making it now if I have to get store bought basil, it has to be fresh from the garden.

Semi-Homemade Cooking starring Sandra Lex

I would use pesto-flavored toothpaste in a heartbeat

I would also probably lose all of my friends

Mossy green teeth is a good look, though.

Can Lex make a cocktail from lemon juice, half and half, vermouth and nonpareils?

is our pesto just better than yours? pretty much everyone i know, including the hardline cooks, is happy to buy pesto jars

fresh basil and store-bought dried basil are like not even remotely the same product. dried basil is almost flavorless, and fresh basil is like whoa.

my pesto brings all the boys to the yard IIRC

i can make cocktails though my measurements are not always very exact, especially by the point they happen

is our pesto just better than yours? pretty much everyone i know, including the hardline cooks, is happy to buy pesto jars

the pesto is fine, ppl are mostly on a "zomg I made this" kick in the US atm

i have never bought basil of any kind. i wouldn't have a clue what to do with it. put it in the microwave?

now you just funnin', son.

It does the rest.

fave pesto-related sandwich: nice italian roll with fresh mozarella, pesto, sun-dried tomato. and basil leaves if you want. mmmm....

you can also make this for two for under 30 dollars at home.

fresh basil and store-bought dried basil are like not even remotely the same product. dried basil is almost flavorless, and fresh basil is like whoa.

I don't mean dried basil, just basil from the produce section. Having a garden has spoiled me, even the fresh basil from the store tastes a little off now.

the pesto is fine, ppl are mostly on a "zomg I made this" kick in the US atm

there's a bit of this over here, i tend to roll my eyes at it

I know where surm is coming from on the "fluffy" descriptor -- I like to make it with a little less oil than recipes generally call for*, and when it's straight out of the food processor, fluffy is pretty accurate.

*because I'll be adding a layer of oil to the part I don't freeze, to keep it from oxidizing; by the time I've used it all up, it's fairly wet

xpost--
T/S: learned helplessness vs. feigned helplessness

I am going to grow a basil plant in our garden just for lex. He'll come out here for some interview, I'll demonstrate how this can be made into pesto, wisdom will then be achieved. Then as per amateurist's post my apartment will explode.

that goes for all dried vs. fresh herbs. they have totally different uses.

xp

Pesto is the best. Fresh basil is one of my favorite things in the whole world. Nicole otm about fresh from the garden basil. I used to bring big bags of it home with me from my parents' where my dad had a huge plant. SO SO GOOD.

My main objection to most pre-packaged ready-to-eat stuff (including pesto in jars) is all of the chemicals and preservatives in it. Sky-high sodium, for instance.

it's nice to have a basil plant near an open window because when you get a breeze it spreads basily goodness through the kitchen.

mmmmmmmm basil.

I am fine with a lot of dried herbs but basil is just something that is nowhere near as good dried. MMMMM basil, I love you.

lol x-post

I love fresh basil too but ime it has to be used, like, RIGHT AWAY cuz really there's no way to keep it fresh for more than a day or so before it turns black and slimy

xp

Oh I don't care about sodium. I have low blood pressure. Bring on the jars of pesto. I'll eat am all.

I make basil ice cubes if I have a lot leftover.