Ramsons season
Ramsons or wild garlic is a little green plant which maturates in march and april for a very short period. The leaves have a fine taste of garlic and they are a real spring highlight of fresh intensity in the kitchen.
Wild garlic is a wonderful add-on for grilled meat and saussages.
Because the harvest season of this wonderful spring herb is not synchronized with the barbecue season, you have to find a way to preserve ramsons. The best way I found was to make a delicious wild garlic paesto. Not only with all kinds of meat this paesto delivers a great taste combination, but also on fresh white bread, within a salad vinaigrette or mixed under spaghetti
Homemade paesto
Paesto is one of the easiest ways to preserve all kinds of herbs, not only wild garlic. The preservation is done by oil and a lot of salt, the best one to use for peasto is raw sea salt.
All you need is a big bunch of herbs finely chopped. Add 6 dried tomatoes in very fine slices, a big spoon of black
crushed pepper, if you have sechuan pepper, and two tea spoons of seasalt. Over that pure olive oil until the herbs are covered. Mix it and let it rest for a while. After half an hour stir it again, if necessary add more oil. The paesto in this condition has to taste very salty. The salt will be absorbed by the herbs lateron when you store it. The best way to store
peasto are little glasses in the fridge. Be sure that the surface of the herbs is covered by olive oil during the storage.
Refinement
For refinement you can add two tea spoons of finely chopped lemon peel. The lemon leaves a bit of freshness on the deep garlic aroma.
Another very tasty addition are crushed nuts: walnuts, sunflower seed or even hazelnuts. The nuts dispens their fine flavour and enrich the basis of your paesto by their oily texture.
dolce vita ahoi • monika ebert • mobile minds
