Broccoli sauce with walnuts and lemon

Blender alert (see Note)

This creamy broccoli sauce is perfect for pasta, and so easy to make. Whizzed together with walnuts and seasonings, it is both surprisingly satisfying and creamy. The first time I cooked it, my reaction was that it was hard to believe that it was dairy free.  Broccoli is by no means a voyaging vegetable, because it keeps so poorly, but it is readily available in many places. This recipe is a particularly good way of using up broccoli, when has started to turn yellow and it's great if you haven't been able to use up the stalk.

I like to serve it with spaghetti, but I think it would go well with most varieties of pasta.

 

Serves 2 

 

Ingredients

 

1/2 broccoli

1/3 cup walnuts

1 clove garlic

1/2 tsp onion powder

juice of 1/2 lemon

1 tbsp nutritionalyeast

1/4 tsp chilli flakes

1 tbsp olive oil

salt and pepper

 

Instructions:

• Add about half a cup of water to a saucepan and bring it to the boil.
• Cut the broccoli into florets, and cut off the woody end. Peel the thick skin from the stalk and slice the stalk. (You can use a peeler, if you wish, but I find that you can loosen the skin from the base of the stalk and simply tear it off with your knife blade.) Boil the broccoli and stalk for 4-5 minutes until just soft.
• Remove from the pan, reserving the cooking water, and tip it into a blender or food processor.
• Add the walnuts, garlic, onion powder, lemon and olive oil to the blender with the broccoli and whizz them together until they form a smooth paste.
• Season generously with salt and pepper, then add a little of the cooking water, whizz again, and continue adding more water until it reaches a sauce-like consistency.  Check the seasoning, once the sauce is the thickness you want..
• In the meantime, cook your pasta of choice according to the instructions on the package. You can use some of the pasta water in the sauce to thin it to the correct consistency, if necessary.

Serve the sauce piping hot with the pasta, with more black pepper ground over it.

 

Note:

• If you don’t have a blender, you can still make this into a delicious sauce, but of course it won’t be as creamy.

Variations:

• Leave out the salt and/or lemon juice and add some salted lemon at the blender stage.
• Add freshly-grated nutmeg just before serving.
• instead of blending in the walnuts, chop them, to add additional texture to the sauce.
• Instead of using onion powder, chop a small onion and cook it with the broccoli.
• Rather than using this as a pasta sauce, pour it over vegetables or any main course dish.