July 18, 2007: Beetroot pesto pasta

Today's dinner inspiration comes from A Veggie Venture. Cindy was in the mood for a simple pesto-based pasta and, to mix things up a little, I decided to have a crack at this beet pesto instead of the standard basil option. There was a downside to this choice - the process of roasting beetroots is a lot more time-consuming than rinsing basil, but there were upsides too: successful beet-roasting, an interesting new pesto flavour, and easily the pinkest meal I've ever cooked.

By the time the beets had spent an hour or so in the oven roasting, dinner was a snap - the pesto took about 3 minutes to throw together in the food processor and then you just stir it through some cooked pasta with a few mushrooms and a bit of capsicum and then dinner is served. Piece of cake. The pesto dyes the pasta shocking pink, and adds a sweet, nutty flavour to what would otherwise be a fairly bland meal.

Beetroot pesto
4 beetroots
3 cloves of garlic
1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 cup pine nuts
Some leftover gruyere cheese (or whatever else is about the house)
1 bunch of coriander

Wash the beets and trim any unruly stalks off. Place them in a baking tray, splash a bit of oil and balsamic vinegar over them and then roast for an hour or so at about 200 degrees, turning a few times.

Once the beets are done (the skin will crackle and bubble a little, see above), take them out of the oven and let them cool. When they've stopped being too hot to handle, scrape the skin off and chop the beets coarsely.

Throw the beets and all the other ingredients into a food processor and whiz until it's a nice coarse texture (to be honest, for a pasta sauce, it might be better to up the olive oil a little).



Beetroot pesto pasta
Prepare beet pesto (above). Cook 1 packet of pasta, drain. Fry some mushrooms and capsicum in a little olive oil. Stir the pesto, vegies and pasta together. Voila!