Warrigal greens pesto spaghetti

Bring Australian native ingredients to your menu with this warrigal greens pesto pasta. Featuring native mountain pepper berry and warrigal greens, it’s a nutritious delight.

Ingredients

• ½ red onion (unpeeled)
• 1 garlic clove (unpeeled)
• 1 spray of olive oil
• 210g spaghetti
• 300g silken tofu
• 120g Warrigal greens (can be substituted for baby spinach)
• 10g fresh basil leaves
• 2 tbsp lemon juice
• ¼ tsp ground native mountain pepper berry (can be substituted for black pepper)
• 2 tsp olive oil
• 1 cup mushrooms (sliced)
• 4 cans cannellini beans (drained and rinsed)
• 840g cherry tomatoes (quartered)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 200°C. Line a baking tray with baking paper.
2. Place unpeeled onion and garlic on the prepared tray and lightly spray with oil. Bake for 30–40 minutes, until the onion is tender. Once cool enough to handle, peel the onion and discard the skins. Slice off the end of the garlic cloves and squeeze the roasted garlic out.
3. Meanwhile, cook spaghetti according to packet instructions. Drain and return to the same pot.
4. It’s important to blanch your warrigal greens before cooking or serving. To prepare, boil the greens in water for 3–5 minutes and then drain. Immediately rinse the greens thoroughly in cold water. Pat the greens dry to remove excess water and set aside.
5. In a large food processor, process the tofu, warrigal greens and basil until smooth. Add lemon juice, roasted onion and garlic and pepper berry, to taste. Process until combined.
6. In a large and deep frying pan, heat olive oil on medium-high heat. Cook mushrooms, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes or until golden. Add beans and tomatoes and cook, stirring, for 2 minutes or until combined and heated through.
7. Add warrigal pesto sauce and bean mixture to the spaghetti and stir over low heat to combine and heat through.
8. Serve spaghetti in bowls or serving trays.

Recipe tips

• Use any variety of pasta you have on hand.
• Warrigal greens are bush tucker greens and are commonly used as you would use baby spinach leaves. Like some other greens, warrigal greens contain oxalic acid, so they should be blanched (boiled) for 3–5 minutes before cooking or eating.
• If your warrigal greens come on the vine, you can turn this into a cooking activity and get the children involved in helping to pick the leaves off the vine, as this can be time consuming. It’s also a great way to educate them about the ingredient. If you cannot source warrigal greens you can use baby spinach leaves instead.
• Mountain pepper is commonly known as native pepper, Tasmanian pepper, pepper berry and pepperleaf. Use this as you would normal black pepper and add to taste, as it has a bit of a kick to it. If you cannot source native mountain pepper berry you can use freshly ground black pepper instead.
• For larger serves, you will need to cook the ingredients in batches or across 2-4 large, deep frying pans and pots.

This recipe is provided by the Healthy Eating Advisory Service (HEAS) and was originally published on the HEAS website.