We are on week three of The Food Matters Project, and I am loving the recipes that everyone has picked so far! This week is no exception… Heather from girlichef chose a roasted red pepper and walnut ‘pesto’, a fabulously simple and quick recipe that you literally can whip together in five minutes or less.

I used my trusty vitamix, and threw in everything all at once… garlic, walnuts, roasted red peppers (you can make your own, but I think the jarred kind you can find at the store work just fine!), basil, olive oil, salt & pepper.

We first tried it as a dip with some salty blue tortilla chips… what a great combination, and it would be perfect for a party.  I also added a little to a turkey sandwich and it was really delicious.  Mark Bittman has a couple of variations you can do, either by adding goat or feta cheese to make it cheesy, or adding white beans if you don’t want the red pepper flavor to be quite as obvious.   These sound good, but I  think he hit it spot on with the original… it’s creamy and I don’t find it overpoweringly red pepper-y.

We also tried it with some pasta… I tossed the last bit of leftover dip with some bionaturae fusilli (my favorite pasta, try it if you can find it – I buy it at Whole Foods and other specialty food shops), and served it with a healthy cloud of grated pecorino romano and cracked pepper on top.  Soooo good… I love how versatile this recipe is!

The full recipe is posted here, and make sure you take a look at the comments on this post to see how everyone else did!