Dish 19: White Bean & Pesto Lettuce Wraps

I'll admit, Sorrel Pesto isn't exactly a "dish," but still incredibly useful.

Came home lazy and needing something fast. Assembled some wraps with Buttercrunch Lettuce Leaves, white bean garlic scape dip, some daikon and carrot chopped up into thin sticks and a little sorrel pesto. 

Not hearty enough to be a meal but somehow meal-er than just dipping the carrots and daikon in that dip. 

Nom. 

Dish 15 (Sauce 1): Sorrel Pesto

I don't like traditional pesto. I want to but just basil doesn't do it for me. This I love though.

Sorrel Pesto won my list of ideas, though the drink was tempting if only because I'd have it for a while. I used a few recipes as a base and started with the following ingredients:

- 2 cloves garlic

- 2 cups (packed) chopped sorrel

- (less than) 1/4 cup pecorino 

- 1/4 cup toasted walnuts

- olive oil and salt as needed

Missing something? Yep. The walnuts. We'll get to them later. 

I chopped up the garlic in a (crazy loud) food processor. Added some of the greens, some of the pecorino. The rest of the greens. Drizzled in olive oil. A little salt. Tasted, decided it was good. 

I'd scooped it out into my (tiiiny) tupperware container when I realized I'd forgotten the walnuts. I toasted those up in a dry pan, chopped em up in the food pro then added the pesto, blended a little more. Still turned out well.

After it was out I added a touch more salt. 

Some recipes I read called for lemon juice. Really? Have you tasted the sorrel? It's ammmaaazing. And deadly (in theory- oh hey, so is rhubarb!). 

And before you ask, why such a tiny amount on the bread in the first pic? I used a spatula to get 95% of it out of the food processor, then sliced up that bread to pick up the rest. 

Too good to waste. 

Delivery 2

Delivery 2 was much like Delivery 1. I'm happy there's levels of consistency and variation so I can build on prior experience but not get too stagnant- but I do wish kale had carried over. So it goes.

Here's the haul:

Bok Choi - 1 head

Chinese Cabbage - 1 head

Red Sails Lettuce -1 head

Romaine Lettuce - 1 head

Buttercrunch Lettuce - 1 head

Mustard Greens - 1 bunch

Mizuna - 1 bunch 

Sorrel - 1 bunch

Sage with Flowers - 1 bunch

Garlic Scapes - 6 scapes
 

And the highlights:

Sorrel: I had no strong feelings about this guy when I saw it on the list, but then I ate a leaf...awesome! A really nice citrusy bite, especially the stems.

From Wikipedia: "The plant's sharp taste is due to oxalic acid, which is a poison. In small quantities sorrel is harmless; in large quantities it can be fatal." Neat!

Lots of stuff to do with this guy- there are drinks, pesto, or some kind of tart? I read the flavor mellows when it cooks, so I'm thinking the pesto.

Butter Crunch Lettuce: This is the cartoon lettuce shaped lettuce- does it come across in pics? The leaves feel nicely pliant so I may use it in a wrap situation. Like this.

Sage (with flowers): Don't get me wrong- this is very pretty- but doesn't the effort of growing flowers take some of the oomph out of the leaves? Apparently sage is good with chicken liver- which I know, gross, but I need to eat more iron and that's one of the best sources. Also- liver mousse? Nom. Here are a few choices for when I'm looking.

Garlic Scapes: The sign said take six out of the bin, so I did. Apparently they ran out of rhubarb last week- I have a feeling the shareholders showing up last minute may be scapeless. There are interesting looking dips (apparently suuuper strong, so it's in the lead), on a pizza, or in okonomiyaki or biscuits. So- basically- all the things.

And our good friend Mr Chinese Cabbage. Obviously not new, but I got a monster-sized head. It's already been cut up for a second, appropriately spiced, batch of kimchi.

Oh and I found a little slug on my kale. He was kind of cute (no pics, sorry), but yeah, guess we know it's organic!