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Do you look at recipes in glossy magazines and cookbooks and despair of ever making anything like that yourself? The nzgirl Test Kitchen is about real, easy food that anyone can make. We search out recipes, then test them, so you can see what the food really turns out like. Asparagus Pesto Pasta Editor’s Note: When it comes to cooking I’m a complete retard. I love to eat, but putting together anything more complicated than opening pre-packaged sauce, stresses me out. So I was pretty amazed by how simple this incredibly tasty dish was to prepare. Not only did it score full points for deliciousness, but it was easy to make and I would be confident enough to whip it up when entertaining friends. Time to prepare: We whipped this dish up in about 25 minutes, but it’s so straightforward you could probably do it even quicker with practice, making it great for a post-work dinner.
The $$$: This is an economical dish to make and it's easy to up the ingredients to serve extra mouths. It doesn't require anything hard to find, and a lot of the ingredients will already be in the pantry.
Ingredients | Cost | Asparagus | $3.00 | Pine nuts | $3.19 | Lemon | 0.60c | Spaghetti | $2.42 | Baby Spinach | $3.19 | Garlic | $1.33 | Grated Parmesan | $3.29 | TOTAL: | $20.02 | COST PER SERVE (Approx) | $5.00 |
Taste rating: The office was unanimous; this dish scored full marks on the taste scale. Ingredients Serves 4 1 bunch of asparagus (trimmed of ends and cut in half) .jpg) 3 handfuls of baby spinach leaves (we also used extra to garnish) 2 cloves of garlic, peeled 1 cup of grated parmesan cheese, plus extra for topping 1 cup of pine nuts ¼ cup of extra virgin olive oil Juice of ½ lemon ½ teaspoon of fine-grain sea salt Fresh or dried pasta (we used spaghetti, as a guide a 50c sized bunch should feed two people) 
1: Bring 2 pots of water to a boil – one large pot for the pasta and one medium sized pot for the asparagus. 2: While the water is heating, put the pine nuts in a single layer in a large fry pan. Heat on medium, stirring occasionally until fragrant and lightly browned (they smell so good!). Remove the pine nuts from the pan and set aside - you need ¾ for the pesto, the rest to garnish. 3: Salt the asparagus water and drop the spears in. Cook for only 2 - 3 minutes so the spears are still bright green and barely tender. Drain under cool water to stop the cooking. Cut the tips off and set aside to add to the dish later.
4: Salt the pasta water and add spaghetti, cooking until just tender.
5: Add the asapargus, spinach, garlic, parmesan and ¾ cup of pine nuts to a food processor (or blender). Puree and, with the motor running, drizzle in the quarter cup of olive oil until a paste forms. If too thick, thin it with a bit of the pasta water. Add the lemon juice and salt, taste and adjust if required.
6: Drain pasta and immediately toss with the asparagus pesto. Add the cooked asparagus you set aside before and sprinkle with grated parmesan, toasted pine nuts and some of the baby spinach. If you need want meat, serve with chicken or add some cooked bacon.
Variations: Aspargus season is coming to a close, but you may still be able to source imported stalks. Otherwise try substituting canned asaparagus or use a different vegetable altogether (we think mushrooms or oven roasted capsicums would work well).
Gemma
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