Basil pesto disappointment

Made pesto tonight with basil from the garden. I wasn’t terribly pleased with the results. It tasted flat… somehow not lively.

I followed a recipe on Epicurious, but I think where I went wrong was in that we didn’t have walnuts or pinenuts, and instead used pecans. We thought we had walnuts, but they turned out to be an extra bag of pecans.

Attempting to be adaptable, I forged ahead. Probably won’t do that again, as the result was well… flat and lifeless. Not only that, but the pesto was dark. I’ve made this stuff before, and it was bright green. What gives?

I put it on a Whole Foods pizza crust and put some thin-sliced new potatoes and parmesan cheese over that, and baked it. Again, ho-hum. Maybe I don’t really like pesto after all.

I’m not much of a cook. Makes me wonder why in the heck I really want to grow so many vegetables.

In fact, while I have lots of them – more than I really know what to do with – the tomatoes are really starting to give me pause. Two of the varieties, the porters and the celebrities, aren’t very tasty. In fact, my employer, Sam, remarked that they tasted like supermarket tomatoes after I gave him some to try. Kiss of death – “supermarket tomatoes” – but I agree. Not tangy, a little on the watery and pithy side. The cherry tomatoes are quite the treat, but they don’t work well on sandwiches. I know I need to grow different varieties next year, hopefully something tastier. Or maybe the soil needs something. More fertilizer? More compost?

Dunno. I’m actually a little discouraged by gardening right now. Hopefully the green beans will rescue my opinion of my efforts.