Carrot Pesto

As you can see here, here and here, I obviously love pesto with all different sorts of ingredients. For a complete list, please enter 'pesto' in the Search box of my blog. For some time now, I've wanted to try out a carrot pesto. My other half brought more of the lovely local yellow carrots back and since they taste like 'real' carrots I finally did it. Tastes great not just with pasta but also with unpeeled boiled potatoes and is great as a dip or sandwich spread.

500 g carrots
1 pointed red pepper
2 garlic cloves
2 small handfuls of (toasted) hazelnuts
50-75 g freshly grated parmesan
sea sal
freshly ground black pepper
1 tsp fresh thyme leaves
1 tsp cumin
extra virgin olive oil

Half the pepper lengthways and core. Place under a hot grill until the skin starts to blacken. Transfer into a plastic bow and put the lid on. A plastic freezer bag works as well.

Meanwhile peel the carrots and slice them into 2 mm thick slices. Bring a pan with about an inch of water to the boil. Steam the carrots for 10-12 minutes until they are just tender.

Coarsely chop the nuts or grind them in a food processor. Place all the ingredients into a food processor or the beaker of a handheld blender and whizz.

Variation:
1 kg of (yellow) carrots
80 g unpeeled almonds
juice of 2 limes
2 garlic cloves
2 tsp toasted cumin
75 g parmesan
pepper
salt
extra virgin olive oil
30 g fresh coriander

Prepare as above using as much olive oil as you think it needs. Make the pesto Wash, spin and chop the coriander. Add to the pesto and whizz for a couple more minutes.

Because of the lime juice and lack of sweet peppers this is a much lighter pesto that's also great as a sandwich spread or with crackers.