Presto Pesto!

I love pesto. It's one of the easiest things for me to make since the sauce does not require cooking. It is basically a bunch of fresh herb, nuts, and olive oil in a blender. Doesn't that just make it a liquid version of an herb salad? Though I did boil the linguine and make some turkey meatballs from scratch, so some cooking was involved. I had some leftover Asagio cheese spread that I decided to throw in. So I hit all four food groups with this one dish, that's always a plus.

Zesty Parsley-Walnut Pesto
1 bunch of fresh parsley
1/2 cup walnuts
1/2 cup olive oil
5 tbsp Asagio cheese spread
3 tbsp grated parmesan cheese
1 tbsp roasted garlic
zest of 1 lemon
juice from 1/2 lemon
Salt 'n Pepper to taste

Dump everything into a blender or food processor and blend until smooth. Also freezes beautifully. I divided up the pesto into individual portions and froze them in plastic containers, along w/ the turkey meatballs and some slightly under cooked linguine. Talk about creating your own TV dinners.

Turkey Meatballs
1 pound of ground turkey
1/4 cup fine bread/cracker crumbs
3 tbsp garlic powder
3 tbsp dried parsley
2 tsp salt
2 tsp black pepper
1 egg
2 tbsp olive oil

Blend the crumbs, garlic powder, dried parsley, salt and pepper in your handy dandy blender. In a med sized bowl, mix the turkey, egg, olive oil and crumb mixture together. Preheat oven to 350. Form meatballs and place on baking sheet. Bake for about 20 min, depending on how big you make your meatballs.