A simple-to-make and delectable little paste with which to dress just-cooked pasta, to spoon into vegetable soups, to thin with milk or vegetable stock into, itself, a fine soup, to stuff into fat, ripe tomatoes, to present alongside roasted meat or fish, to spread on great chunks of olive-oil-toasted bread, to eat with a spoon while waiting for bread to bake.
Recipe information
Yield
makes about 6 cups
Ingredients
Preparation
Step 1
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Cut thin slices from both ends of the zucchini, slice them in half lengthwise, and lay them in a single layer on a baking sheet. Strew the garlic cloves about the zucchini, drizzle the whole with the olive oil, sprinkle on the sea salt, generously grind over the pepper, and roast them for 40 minutes or until the zucchini are very soft and nicely charred and the garlic is soft and deeply golden. Leave the zucchini and the garlic to cool a bit. Slip the skins from the garlic.
Step 2
In the work bowl of a food processor fitted with a steel blade, process the zucchini and the garlic to a puree, add the cheese, lemon juice, zest, and the cream and process for 20 seconds to make a smooth paste. At the last, add the basil leaves and process a few seconds more.
Step 3
Turn the paste out into a bowl. Taste it, adding more sea salt should you desire it.
