Recovery food: Avocado, Rocket & Brazil Nut Pesto Pasta
Since my birthday I’ve been suffering rather badly with a horrible virus sporting flu-like symptoms with fever and have essentially been bed-ridden (sob). But as today’s the first day I’ve started to feel a little better I thought I’d try out a recipe from a brand new book I was given for my birthday – the wonderful Deliciously Ella. I’ve been following Ella on Instagram for ages and her approach to food has really struck a chord with me. For the past year I’ve really struggled with being able to digest some foods and noticed that I just can’t eat heavily processed or really rich foods without feeling awful. I’ve cut out milk, butter and most cheese (apart from on special occasions!) and try only to eat unprocessed foods and this has helped a lot, so I was really excited to try out some of Ella’s recipes as they all look amazing.
I’ve opted to go for a really comforting pasta and pesto meal, because this was one of my absolute favourite meals and I’ve been looking for a good vegan pesto recipe for a long time. Most of the things in this recipe I bought either at the East Oxford Community Market, or the Continental and Eastern Deli opposite Costa on the Cowley Road (this is my favourite place to buy things like tinned tomatoes, nuts and spices as it’s so much cheaper than anywhere else, and it’s always a delight to have a chat with the owner, the world’s friendliest man).
Ella has made a great video on her website about this recipe, but here’s my take:
Deliciously Ella's Brazil Nut and Rocket Pesto Pasta
Serves 4
Ingredients: • 120g brazil nuts • 50g pine nuts • 1 large avocado • 2 handfuls of rocket • 2 handfuls of basil leaves • juice of 1 lemon • 8 tablespoons of olive oil • 500g pasta (I used a mixture of wholemeal twirls and white conchiglie) • 2 courgettes • 1 head of broccoli • 200g frozen peas • salt and pepper 1. Put the brazil and pine nuts into the food processor and blend until crushed. Then add the avocado, rocket, basil leaves, lemon juice, olive oil, 8 tablespoons of water and salt and pepper. Blend until it’s smooth and creamy. Try not to eat it all out of the blender.
2. Cook the pasta according to packet instructions (I do mine with a bit of olive oil in the water to stop it sticking together). Put the frozen peas into the water about 3 minutes before the end and drain all together.
3. Slice the courgettes fairly thinly and cut the broccoli into small pieces. Fry with a tiny bit of oil and pepper for around 5 minutes – I like my courgettes to be slightly browned.
4. Put everything into a large bowl and mix together.
This is honestly the nicest pesto I have ever eaten – the avocado gives it such an amazing creaminess and the lemon juice makes it zesty. It was really quick and easy to make, too. This makes a really generous 4 portions, so there’ll be plenty left over for lunch the next day.