Wild Garlic And Cashew Pesto

Where my inlaws live, the public bridleway is lined with wild garlic on one side and dandelions on the other. It’s a foragers feast! Last year I picked a shopping bag full of wild garlic, brought it home, cooked with it and stuck a two plants in a pot. They looked as though they were dying, so I forgot about them and got on with the year. Cleaning out the garden this spring, I found four beautiful Ramson plants! I actually did a little happy dance, because I sometimes crave this stuff!

Wild garlic is simply delicious stuff. In the spring it has a much milder taste than late in the summer, and unlike it’s commercial counterpart, you eat the leaves and the flowers, not the bulb (although you could).

Identification: You can smell the garlic before you see the plant. It has broad, spearlike leaves, which smell like garlic, and pretty white, star-like flowers, in a rounded ball shape, which also smell like garlic. All parts are edible, the leaves preferably in spring.

Poisonous lookalikes: The leaves do look a lot like the Lily of the Valley, which is poisonous but doesn’t smell like garlic, and if it doesn’t smell like garlic, it isn’t wild garlic.

Uses: Basically, anything you could do with Basil, you can do with wild garlic. You can make a soup, add it to salads, stir fry with onion and olive oil as a vegetable (instead of spinach, for example), and add a few dandelion heads for colour.

Here’s on my favourite recipes for Wild Garlic: Wild Garlic and Cashew Pesto

(Pine nuts are seriously expensive. Cashews are a lot cheaper, and just as good.)

5.0 from 1 reviews

Wild Garlic And Cashew Pesto

 

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Prep time

1 min

Total time

1 min

 

The amounts in this recipe are rough guides. If you have more or less of an ingredient, it doesn't matter. Cashews provide the 'bulk' in the ingredients, and the Ramsons are very strong in flavour, so while you can add more you don't need to.

Author: Luschka

Recipe type: Dip, Sauce,

Cuisine: Pasta

Serves: 4 - 6

Ingredients

• ½ cup loosely packed Ramsons/Wild Garlic
• ½ cup Cashew Nuts
• ¼ cup Parmesan Cheese
• ½ teaspoon Sea Salt
• Pepper to taste
• ⅓ cup Olive Oil

Instructions

1. If you're using a Thermomix®, place everything in the bowl, and blits on Turbo for 3 seconds and you're done.
2. If you're not:
3. Crush the cashew nuts
4. Grate the Parmesan Cheese
5. Place the salt into a pestle and mortar and add the wild garlic. Use the 'friction' of the salt to crush them together.
6. Add the olive oil for a smooth paste, before adding the cheese and cashews and stirring in well.
7. Pepper to taste.

Notes

Use as a spread on a rustic bread or as pesto for pasta. Keeps for around 3 days in the fridge. Top with edible Ramson flowers for prettiness.

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