This week yielded frost on the rooftops of many of the houses in my neighborhood and I must say I panicked. Not in the sense that it was becoming colder in Wisconsin and that adult hibernation is near, but the fact that I still have tomatoes growing and a lot of basil in my backyard. If there is one thing that is disappointing, it is when frost takes over and basically destroys what you have tried to keep up with all of spring and summer. So after returning from work, I decided to harvest what I could from the garden, of which included huge bushels of basil, a handful of tomatoes, and a few habanero peppers.
I immediately made some of my favorite pesto, and as I was thinking I was going to be making several cups of pesto due to the amount of leaves I my daughter and I plucked off, I was actually surprised that it only yielded about 1 1/2 cups of the delicious stuff. Now that I had a bunch of pesto, I was thinking to myself of what I could make, and lately, I cannot get quesadillas off the brain. And there we have it, simple, but ever so tasty, pesto filled quesadilla.
Ingredients (for each quesadilla):
- Small Flour Tortilla(s)
- 1 tbsp fresh pesto
- 6 slices of quesadilla cheese, sliced 1/4 inch thick
That’s it on the ingredients, but trust me, three simple things make a huge difference when you bit into one!
Let me talk about the cheese. Upon a recent visit to my favorite supermercado, I scanned their cheese case, looking at all of the options. One cheese stood out, and that was El Tapatio Quesadilla. That just meant that this had to be the perfect cheese for making quesadillas, and indeed it was.
So begin by heating a small cast iron skillet on medium-low heat, as in my opinion this is a great skillet and can handle a great amount of heat. Lay the tortilla in the skillet, spread the pesto on the top half of the tortilla, and lay the cheese on the tortilla. As soon as you see the cheese begin to melt, take a spoon, and fold over, gently pressing down on the tortilla. This will squeeze out some of the cheese, and to me, this is just as good as the entire quesadilla. The cheese will slowly seep out and begin to crisp up a bit, and to me, that is exciting. Let cook for a couple of minutes, then remove, letting cool for a few minutes.
When you are ready, serve as is, or slice on the diagonal.
Trust me when I say this, not only does the El Tapatio quesadilla make this thing shine, the warm pesto, and the outer burnt cheese just makes you want to make another, in which case I did. Enjoy!