Homemade Pesto With Sausage Rounds on Rotini

This is a simple pasta dish made with homemade organic pesto, sauteed chicken sausage rounds and served over rotini pasta with grated Parmesan cheese. The exquisite flavor of this dish comes from the pesto freshly made from our garden's organic basil.

Homemade pesto sauce is one of our mainstays. We grow basil in the summer and prepare fresh pesto sauce from July through October. In the winter and spring, we buy batches of organic basil and prepare fresh pesto while freezing whatever we can't easily use. Our basil makes the best pesto as it is no more than two hours from harvest to table.

We have two pictures of our fresh pesto to show how it differs from that which one gets in a jar. Notice the light all most fluorescent green color as opposed to the dark green of canned or frozen pesto. We make it in small batches in our Ninja Blender. If any is not used immediately, we cover, refrigerate and use within a few days.

We have published a recipe for our pesto but in truth, I don't follow it. I make it as follows:

The Morgan's Pesto Sauce
Serves two with a little left over.
1. Fill the small Ninja Blender with washed and stemmed freshly picked basil leaves.
2. Pour in a couple of glugs of extra virgin olive oil.
3. Put in a small handful of lightly browned pignolis(pine nuts).
4. Add a couple of tablespoons of grated parmesan.
5. Add several skinned cloves of garlic.
6. Add a pinch of red pepper flakes and a pinch or two of salt.
7. Pulse blend until fairly well mixed.
8. Taste and check texture.
9. Add salt if needed. Add oil if needed, Add cheese if needed. Add pignolis if needed. Add these in small amounts, then pulse until mixed. repeat if necessary.

Note: The amount that you add depends on how it tastes to you. Be careful, but be bold as you have to adjust almost every recipe to your own taste and this is a great way to practice.

Enjoy this dish with a mellow red wine such as a good Old Vine Zin.

Buon appetito,
Tom and Anita