Pesto from beet greens and spinach
Bartering, skill exchanging, and the gift economy may seem like modern, hippy-flavoured ideas to many in mainstream society, but this is the way humanity used to function before money was invented. Money is a symbol we use for the energy behind the fair exchange of human goods and services, but in many ways the energy is forgotten, and the symbol has become the reality for most of us. The management of the symbol we call money of course is big business, and human greed being what it is, the value of hard work and fair exchange is all but forgotten in the scramble for personal gain, and in the knock-on effects of the debt-slavery mind set the world has entered into. There is nothing inherently wrong with money – it is merely that we have allowed what began as a convenience to become a prison of sorts, where the energy that money symbolises is blocked from its natural flow.
In our family, we are always happy to exchange goods or services, as well as using the symbol of money. We recently visited Clearwater Gardens Farm, at the gateway to what is locally known as “The Promised Land”, an organic family-run farm in one of the most beautiful parts of this country. We arrived with fermented vegetables, two kinds of ginger/turmeric beer, and some fermented lemon barley water. We left with more vegetables than most of us see in one place at any time, and some jars of fermented vegetables. I will ferment the bulk of the produce, and when it is ready, we’ll share the finished product back with the farm, and with others. The photo above shows some of the vegetables, but not all of them.
We also like to use everything, out of respect for the earth, and it just seems like the right and sensible thing to do. Carrot tops and other greens went in for vegetable stocks for the freezer. Beetroot greens, and some spinach were earmarked for pesto. Which is why we are here - lets make pesto!
Beet green and spinach pesto
4 cups beetroot greens
2 cups of wilted spinach greens
4 – 6 garlic cloves, roasted
100 g pine nuts, roasted
50 g raw cashew nuts
150 gm parmesan cheese, grated
100 ml extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp salt (or to taste)
Fresh ground black pepper to taste
1 - 2 tbsp lemon juice
Wash the greens, and wilt the spinach. I had vegetable stock going on the stove, so I wilted mine in the stock pot. Roast the pine nuts and garlic in a tray in the oven on a medium heat until the skin will peel easily from the garlic, and the nuts are a very light brown. Add all the ingredients except the oil into a food processor, blend for a short time, them continue to blend as the oil is added slowly.
And that’s all there is to it.
Why do we wilt the spinach?
Spinach is high in oxalic acid, which may lead to kidney stones. Some research also indicates that spinach inhibits bodily uptake of iodine. Both of these issues are addressed by a brief wilting or par boiling of the leaves.
Freeze some, and enjoy the rest fresh within three days.
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