When my friend and I were in High School, we would often go shopping in the city which we loved to do as it was always more exciting than shopping in the suburbs. There were always so many people and adults looked like they were always on their way to something interesting or exciting as they’d be walking so fast.
Little did we realise how “exciting” it would be one afternoon. We were travelling on the down escalators into the Queen Victoria Building. There was a man in a suit travelling on the up escalators and we did a double take. He was, and how do I put this delicately…pleasuring himself. I still remember him perfectly to this day because I had never been exposed to a man exposing himself before and because it made me think that hanging out in the city might not be all it was cracked up to be. Disturbingly I remember his face because he was laughing like a maniac and having such a great time that I didn’t know whether to laugh, run or gag.
I also remember what we ate that afternoon. It was an afternoon of firsts (some obviously quite dubious in nature 
) and it was the first time that we had ever tried pesto. Way back then in the 80′s, pasta generally had a creamy or tomato based sauce and the idea of a pesto was intriguing. It wasn’t saucey like the other sauces but it was full of herbs and nuts and flavour. After that, I ordered it wherever I could. It was so “new” that one place made a pesto out of pure mint that tasted like toothpaste!
You don’t have to make pesto just out of basil and other herbs are fun to use. I had half a bunch of parsley that I needed to do something with before the leaves faded so I decided to make a pesto because it’s really the easiest sauce you could ever whip up. To the parsley, I added toasted pine nuts, cheese, oil and garlic and with a quick whizz in the food processor, I had my pesto. Perfect for Christmas gifting, it keeps well especially if you keep it sealed airtight and use a clean spoon every time. I’ve used it for quick dinners with pasta and added it to Mr NQN’s sandwiches for lunch.
Oh and that reminds me, one day I’ll tell you about the time I happened upon my former uni lecturer “helping” himself in his car!
So tell me Dear Reader, what is your favourite pasta sauce? And have you ever been flashed and if so, what was your reaction?
Parsley Pinenut Pesto
- 1/2 bunch or 2 cups of parsley leaves
- 1/2 cup pine nuts, toasted and cooled
- 1/2 cup grated parmigiano reggiano cheese
- 1/2 cup olive oil
- 1-2 cloves garlic, peeled
- salt and lemon juice to taste
1. Place the parsley, pinenuts, reggiano cheese, olive oil and garlic in a food processor and process until it resembles a fine paste. Add salt and lemon juice to taste.
To cook with pasta, add to a drained, cooked pasta and sprinkle with chilli flakes on top.
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47 Comments | Add your own
How timely! I have a big bunch of parsley to use up!
Flavorful! I’ve never used parsley (coriander, rucuola & basil yes)…
Cheers,
Rosa
I think most of us were exposed/flashed one way or the other in our lives. Sadly, those things are hard to forget, true.
Good thing is I don’t have any food memories attached to such episodes. Sorry to hear that you have such associations with pesto… I love basil pesto, but I do love the parsley pesto as well, with walnuts. Pesto is gooooood stuff!
I have only started making my own pesto in the last few weeks. I love pesto and I cook a lot of Italian food and I can hardly believe myself that I didn’t get around to this sooner.
I am pleased to say that I have never come across a flasher. But I once worked at a university that was surrounded by natural bushland and a serial flasher was making a pest of himself when I was working there. Quite a few of my colleagues in the library had a nasty experience parking their cars on the way to work.
I love your fresh spin on pesto! The parsley with pine nuts sounds delicious
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I love pesto and have been meaning to make nettel pesto for a while. Thanks for the inspiration.
Pesto is so jam packed full of flavour isn’t it? So delicious! Definitely more exciting than watching some strange guy expose himself
I saw a guy doing that in London…i laughed as “it” was so small I thought why would you be boasting about that. Anyway…I like the idea of the parsley pesto…I’ll give it a whirl as I have plenty of parsley growing.
The back of my old high school was quite bushy and there was a man we called Willy the Wanker who would hide up there and do you know what. On a dare my friend and I stormed up there to scare him,of course we were so mortified by what we saw we nearly broke our necks on the run down the hill and out of the bush!!!
I have a whole lot of parsley in the garden nearly going to seed-hadn’t thought about making pesto so thank you.
I can only imagine how weird that experience was! Love playing around with pesto. I remember how exotic and different it seemed when I first had it in the 80s too. I was working for a fashion designer and it was on the menu for the after show dinner. I thought it was amazing. GG
Lorraine, you have just brought back a memory. When I was 15, a friend of mine and I had to travel across town to do work experience at a hospital. One afternoon, on the way back home, there he was: a man in our train carriage, with everything hanging out.
It was quite a shock to us too!
My veg patch is currently full of Basil at present, so have been using that, but when I had Coriander by the bucketload I also used that in my Pesto. The Parsley is just springing back so I will definitely give that a try. Your stories no matter what they are about always raise a smile, I shall never look at QVB escalators the same Lorraine!! Happy weekend.
I am 52 years young and was only ever “flashed” once and that was just 3 years ago. It was in Paris, so lots of food association there. It was in quite a busy street. I was surprised as that wasn’t on my list of “must see” in Paris.
Add pesto to a ham and cheese toastie. YUMM
Ugh reminds me of a man I saw in the park once…. Not pretty
But yay for city shopping (in high school, find suburbs so passé)
Your pesto looks so delicious and I am addicted to it wot bruschetta topping!
Cheers
Choc Chip Uru
I really wish you hadn’t said that about the uni lecturer. That makes me picture HORRIFIC things.
LOoooooVELY.
I adore this beautiful green dish/dip/sauce.
In fact, I would like to devour it immediately.
Hope you are well, L. xx
Looks so yum
I actually use a lot of curry-like sauces on pasta but have loved pesto forever
! Must admit that until a year or two back it was always basil/nut pesto, but since I began reading food blogs, many marvellously different pestos, such as this here, have become part of the repertoire! Flashing: most gals have unpleasant memories re that 
! The first time was in a bus and yours truly a very innocent 15: the guy actually tried to bring my hand over his rather voluminous body part! For some reason I thought it was my fault, felt awful lest someone had seen and bolted off the bus at the very next stop! It still happens occasionally, but now it just needs a loud and sarcastic comment to . . . 
!
What a great recipe! Maybe I’m daft, but it never occurred to me to try making pesto out of herbs other than basil! Yum.
I have never been flashed, in the “traditional” way. But once, while doing the Bay Run with my dog, a man was running towards us with quite small running shorts. As he approached, his little friend popped out from where he was hiding to say hello. Suffice to say, the man went bright red and adjusted himself while I tried not to giggle.
I love how you encountered the most extraordinary people along your day!
Some are beyond words what one can say!
Parsley Pesto also love to do!
I found a Parsley Pesto Jamaica Rum Cake if you are interested in too! WHOO HOO!
THANKS Lorraine, neighbour just dropped in a big bunch parsley and I am going to make it right now, thanks again, we are on the same page!! Roz
Just remembered I had one of those over exposure moments, man standing at a bus stop when I was on my way home late at night after working at restaurant, tired and not amused,and another in UK but by then I was older and wiser and was able to laugh at him. Roz
You come across some strange folks. I did come across a couple fishing in the Bay of Islands stark naked as I was sailing by one day. Doesn’t come close to seeing someone wanking on an escalator. That definitely wins the top prize (or bottom?).
I love pesto and you’re right, you can make it out of lots of herbs.
I love using different greens for pesto! I might however now link some weird thoughts to it
Nice pesto-such a vibrant color!
I’ve always been too surprised the few times I’ve been flashed to say anything inteligible, but my friend once pointed and really laughed, which caused immediate “deflation!”
One of my favourites is basil and pinenut pesto that hubby makes on the very rare occasion that he cooks…will have to give him a reminder
never been flashed thankfully!!
Homemade pesto is so far removed from the stuff you get off the supermarket shelf and is relatively easy to make. Love the idea of using parsley instead of basil, nice alternative Lorraine.
You’ve seen some weird things haha! I have to admit there are looneys in the city usually. Yum, pinenuts are so good! I much prefer sundried tomato pesto to basil.
Love pesto! Will try it with parsley next time.
Lorraine you have the most entertaining stories,and in this case with a touch of the weird too and no I can say with almost certainty I have never been flashed – thank goodness for that – I must lead a very innocent life in the country. Although in saying that, sadly there are odd people with even stranger behaviour everywhere. Pesto – love it and make it often in different variations too and is one of my favourites but I also adore pasta alla puttanesca. Being Italian we have pasta a few times a week and enjoy it in so many different ways.
Pesto is my one of my favourites too. Love it both on pasta and on sandwiches – it is definitely a fun way to get the greens in! Your version looks great.
Ewwwwwwe, gross! Not this beautiful recipe, but the freak on the escalator! My friend from uni lives in a small town about an hour outside Toronto; she abhores the city for all its crazies, smells and filth (her words) but it’s inevitable that she must come into our city a few times per year and it never fails that the weirdness follows her around! Two years ago she and her hubby attended a gala for TIFF downtown in the theatre district. They emerged from the gala after one in the morning and proceeded to walk to their vehicle upon which Mike noticed a couple ‘doing it’ on the hood of their big SUV! He did what ever any normal joker would do, he pressed the panic nutton on his fob; now that couple finished in a hurry and ran away! I would have liked to see that, but I live and work in the city and nothing like this ever happens to me.
favorite pasta sauce would be cream over tomato based ones unless it be seafood.
I like to add a little cream in the pasta if it was served hot and in pasta salad id just toss the pesto in. Either way the Italians created another delicious dish.
Oh Lorraine – another of your life’s stories. I too will never look at pesto the same way again. And maybe laughing ones head off in public and pointing at “him and it” might do the trick but sadly one can never tell how those weirdos might react. Sordid!! Hugs Carina
Oh Lorraine -I too will never look at pesto the same again!!!
And maybe laughing loudly and pointing at “him and it” might do the trick but sadly one can never tell how one of those sick weirdos might react. Hug, Carina
Oh my – I’m not sure I would have reacted seeing something like that. eep.
Love the idea of parsley in pesto – I’m not sure why I’ve never tried it. Not I must!
I love the look of this pesto, Lorraine! I could definitely see myself slathering it all over a steak or mixing it into pasta. Delish!
Pesto is the best and so vesatile. I like makig it with corainder. This version is a must try. Some memories do shape us lol. I never got flashed but I answered a perv calling on the phone once. I was so young I did not even realize what he was saying. My mom stopped it in time.
A few years ago (Christmas eve in fact) I was driving to my parents at about 9am and a car was pulled over on the side of the road. The passenger was out of the car and screaming back into the car then proceeded to whip off all his clothes until he was standing there in the nudie. Possibly one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen!
We’ve been having a lot of pesto recently too but mine’s not homemade (close to it though!). Never thought to make it with parsley although I have soo much of it I reallys should.
Goodness -that must have been a little startling! It really is a “boy thing”, too. You never hear of women behaving that way, do you.
I’m still new to pesto
I never use to like it much because I think it was just full of basil hehe but lately I’ve seen some other types of pesto and learned to like it ~
My favourite type of pasta sauce is CREAMY, RICH and THICK hehe like cabonara
Thank gosh I’ve never been flashed PHEW!
The kids love to help me make pesto, we use Basil, but sometimes I forget to buy the pine nuts and we just use raw cashew or pistachio instead. Sadly yes I too had a flashing incident when I was a teenager, I just went back to work (I was at my job) ignored him and he left.
Ewww at the flasher!! You poor thing!
Your pesto looks delicious though, so vibrant and green – what a great way to use up leftover parsley (I usually just forget about it and let it die in my fridge… whoops). And that baguette looks wonderfully crunchy! Beautiful!
Yum – I love how fresh and good looking this pesto is. I just can’t wait to have this for dinner tonight. Delightful.
amazing alliteration and sensational sauce! pesto’s my favorite on pasta.
I literally cannot wait to make this. I always have parsley in my fridge, and sometimes I cannot use them all. I have pine nuts and the rest of ingredients. And when you show those gorgeous baguette with this pesto, who can resit. I’m going to buy really good bread just to enjoy this pesto. EXCITED!!!
Ummmm pesto. In Peru we have a different version, we know there is unique pesto, but we have one that everybody eats at home with pasta, it’s more creamy as it is made with “queso fresco” (fresh cheese) and as pines are very expensive, we make it with pecans. Of course we don’t call it pesto, we call it “green sauce”.
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