Last June, after I took my Raw Food Class, I was really enthusiastic about trying to prepare some of the dishes at home. The recipes were simple, didn’t need a lot of specialized equipment (although a Vitamix
And then, I didn’t do it. Until yesterday. Only four months later. I had purchased some large zucchinis and when thinking about what to do with them, I remembered this:
Zucchini “pasta” with vegan pesto sauce! Yes, I know that it’s nothing fancy, but still. It’s my first! And so simple. You can use any pesto recipe. Just leave out the cheese (you won’t miss it, I promise) to make it vegan. Some recipes call for 1/4 cup of nutritional yeast, but I did not use it.
Basil, good olive oil, garlic, pine nuts (other nuts work too), salt. Toss them in the food processor.
Peel the zucchini. Using your vegetable peeler, continue to peel slices of the zucchini until you reach the core (not sure what it’s called, but it’s kind of seedy with a different texture). Two or three depending on the size.
That’s it. Toss it together and you have a delicious, raw, vegan “pasta” dish.
If that wasn’t enough for you, I want to leave you with this video of my beautiful 11 year old running partner, Penny, on our run today. Does running make you as happy as it makes Penny?
I love zucchini pasta! I bought a spiralizer but can’t figure out how to use it because the instructions are in Japanese. Oops. My veggie peeler works just fine though!
After my class I was ready to buy all the goodies. I couldn’t at the time, but I still might get the spiralizer. It is amazing to see the noodles it makes. I’ll look for one with English instructions, though 🙂
oooh ID SO EAT THIS…which says a lot 🙂
Hurray! I feel like I scored! 🙂
This looks delicious!!! Make me some!? No, actually, it looks simple enough for me to make for MY first raw dish. Thanks for sharing!
Haha! Yes it is simple. Even the pesto, just toss it together and let the food processor do the work.
i never thought of raw zuchinni pasta. I’m not a big fan of pesto but this sure does look delicious!
I imagine a lot of sauces would work. In the class I took, we made a tomato-type sauce and used zucchini lasagna noodles. We also made spaghetti-type noodles and cooked them with fresh tomatoes, garlic, oil and basil. They were all good.
I love this!!! Pesto is one of my fave things to eat! I have a zucchini peeler! 🙂
See, life is good! I love pesto too. There are a lot of variations for pesto, which would all probably work with the zucchini pasta.
Yum! And so healthy. Ok, on the must try list :-). Penny is beautiful.
Penny says thank you. Hard to believe she’s 11, huh?
Yum, I have never tried zuchini pasta.
Try it, you’ll like it! I hadn’t either until my Raw food class, and she had three kinds, lasagna noodles, spaghetti-type noodles (which were actually the only cooked dish), and the peeler noodles. All zucchini.
I love this recipe – and why in the world does everyone add cheese to pesto anyway?
I also love that Penny runs ahead, but then stops to wait on you. What a sweet running buddy. 🙂
When Penny was younger, she would take off ahead of us to the point we’d worry if she was coming back (obviously she always did..eventually). Now that she’s a but older she kindly waits for us.
I agree, no need for cheese (which was why I also skipped the nutritional yeast, even though I usually love it).
Yum! I think this one is a winner!
I definitely was a winner. Now I’m going to check out your mushroom and asparagus casserole. That sounds great!
This looks super yummy. Since dabbling is raw veganism I have found that I love zucchini pasta.
I would really like to get more into it. I get stuck in my food habits, though.
Oh this looks so good!! I love pesto but never thought about making it myself!! I actually didn’t even know all of the components in it!! Lol!
It’s pretty simple. The non vegan version includes cheese, but you really can’t taste the difference.