Woke up this morning to the sound of little feet walking through the hall and into our room... Daddy? Daaaddy?? - - Ah, so so beautiful. When we got Miss M her little Dora bed, we were worried that she would get out of bed all the time just because she could. Fortunately, that hasn't happened (Yet?!), but, in the morning, when she is ready now, she gets up.
I remember before I had kids I was reading something in a magazine where someone was saying that her alarm clock was her daughter coming in and waking her up and I thought, how cool - and I guess it stayed with me all this time. I have been waiting for her to be old enough to come in and wake me up.... Now if she would just get in bed and snuggle instead of wanting us to get up with her! Hahahaa!
Had lots of leftover basil from our CSA basket last week so I decided to make a basil walnut pesto with pasta and steamed rainbow chard - I wasn't sure how it was going to taste, but I wanted to use up some of the produce that we have. Seems like I got behind one or two days last week and I haven't really been able to catch up - I hate to throw the food away, so I am kind of killing myself trying to make sure that we are using everything up. So...I adapted the pesto a little bit from a recipe I found in John Robins' book, just substituting in what I had and adding a little bit here and there...
Walnut Basil Pesto with Pasta
handful of walnut pieces
1 c of fresh basil
1 c of fresh italian parsley
1/2 T white miso
1 garlic clove
1/2 lemon, juiced
1 bunch of rainbow chard
pasta, cooked
Run walnuts through food processor to break up larger pieces, pour into skillet to toast on the stove top for a few minutes over medium. Wash chard, slice horizontally a couple of times, then into one inch sections vertically. Put chard into boiling, salted water and let them cook down for approx 4 - 5 minutes.
To make the pesto, I rough chopped the basil and parsley and put it into the food processor. On top of that, I added the garlic (smashed), the miso, the lemon juice, salt and pepper and then went around 3 or 4 times with olive oil. After processing the pesto, I tasted it, thought it was missing something and added some more pepper and a little bit more salt and maybe another 1/2 T of oil.
I put the pesto into a large bowl, put the drained chard on top, and mixed like a salad until it was incorporated. I slowly added pasta, mixed, and added more until it looked good and pesto covered everything.
It was soooo good - even Miss M liked it! <~~ and that is my TRUE barometer of how good the food is lately!! Hahahaha.
More later!
:)