This Nasturtium Pesto, with its bright green color and bold flavor rings in Spring time. It’s of course, perfect over grain-free and gluten-free pasta. I serve mine with millet capellini by (Big Green Organic Food) because it’s pretty close to the real thing. This pesto is great over eggs in the morning, as a topping on fish, or avocado toast, it’s the ultimate condiment. It is super easy to make, with 9 ingredients total in the food processor, mortar and pestle or high-speed blender. It’s dairy-free, as I replaced the cheese often used in pestos with nutritional Yeast flakes. I used two garlic cloves but feel free to use one or add more. In this recipe, I used un-toasted pine nuts but you can toast them up or use another nut such as walnuts, almonds, or pistachios.

Nasturtiums are an annual bright green plant with bright beautiful edible flowers. In fact, the entire plant can be eaten. I have read that seedpods can be pickled like capers. Yum. The taste of the flowers and leaves is bright and peppery with a mustard-like finish. I love adding the flowers to salads as they add not just a pop of color but a kick too, they dress up a cake beautifully as well. Nasturtium leaves are high in Vitamin C and supposedly are a natural antibiotic.

My experience with nasturtium plants is this. They will take over and grow like weeds, so plant them in a bed or pot on their own because they tend to choke out whatever is growing with them. They propagate like wildfire. I had to take them out of my vegetable garden as they tried to take over so I now I have them in a large planter growing just fine under an oak tree. Cut them back and they will grow again. If you don’t have them in your garden maybe a friend does or you may see some farmers at your local market selling bunches of flowers with leaves. I have seen them sometimes growing wild on the side of a country road and have picked them to my heart’s delight. You will need the leaves for this recipe. The plants are wonderful insect repellants in your vegetable garden and make great companion plants for potatoes, cucumbers, broccoli, cabbage, and kale, amongst others, to deter aphids and other garden nemeses. Have fun with this pesto and make it yours. If you cannot source nasturtiums at all, then make my Lemon Parsley Almond Pesto.

Makes about 1.5-2 cups/ Preparation time 10 minutes

Gather

3 cups/ 163.5 grams, washed nasturtium leaves, packed down

2 garlic cloves, roughly chopped

1/3 cup / 45 grams pine nuts or nut of choice

Zest of half a lemon

2 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice

1 tablespoon nutritional yeast flakes

Dash of honey

1/3 cup / 78.86 ml olive oil

Salt to taste

Make

Place the first 8 ingredients into a food processor or blender and pulse a couple of times. Then turn on the motor and add the oil through the spout on the lid. Stop the motor and scrape down the sides periodically. Process till you have a smooth paste. Add salt to your liking. At the end, I like to chop up and add some of the flowers to add a little more color. If you serve over pasta, garnish with nutritional yeast flakes, hemp seeds, and nasturtium or other edible flowers.

Developed by Anna Getty-Oster and Katherine Howell in The Amalgam Kitchen.