Mushrooms with butternut and basil pesto

I am just back from a trip along the Garden Route in South-Africa and one of the places where I stopped was in Wilderness. It was lunchtime so we entered a restaurant called the Blue Olive. The idea for this recipe is based on what I ate there a big mushroom with butternut and basil pesto.

Ingredients:
- A big mushroom
- Butternut
- 2 cups of basil leaves
- 1 garlic clove
- 1/4 cup pine nuts
- Olive oil
- A pinch salt

Prepare the mushroom by getting out the stem and fry it in a pan with olive oil. It should be nice brown when ready.

The basic idea of the filling is to make a butternut puree mixed with basil pesto. Start by estimating how much butternut you will need. It depends on the size of you mushroom. Peel the butternut and boil it soft (I personally steam it in my microwave). Make the butternut into a puree and add the the basil, garlic, pine nuts, olive oil and salt to it. Mash it further down and scoop the mixture into the mushroom.

You can eat it either warm or cold.

Bell pepper soup

Ingredients:

- 3 bell peppers

- Olive oil

- Water

- Bread

- Spices

Cut up the bell peppers into pieces and drizzle some olive oil over them. Heat the bell peppers and wait until they sizzle. Stir it up. Add water and stir it up again. If you want to give it more flavor you add spices.

To have the right consistency you add bread. Cut up pieces of bread and mix them into the soup so it sucks up the water. The more bread you add, the thicker the soup will be. After bringing it to the boil for 5 minutes, you put it in the blender and blend it smooth.

Since it is fun to play with color you can make an intense red, and make it hot. A yellow/orange one and make it sweet by adding some carrots or so and a minty green one. Only your imagination is the limit.

I like to serve mine simple and in the middle of the soup I add some Boursin.

Scampi with oil and herbs

Ingredients:

- Scampi

- Herbs de Provence

- Olive oil

- Lemon juice

- Garlic (fresh, no pouder)

Defrost the amount of scampi you need and fry them in some oil in a pan (with no pepper or salt). Remove the shell from the scampi and pour generously olive oil over it. Take your fresh garlic and crush it in a garlic press. Mix the crushed garlic underneath the in olive oil coated scampi.

Now comes the delicate part. Pour your herbs de Provence over it but don't add to much. You should have them herbs sticking to the scampi but you don't want a coating of herbs. Mix the herbs de Provence under the scampi/olive oil/garlic and finally to finish it off you add a squeeze of lemon to add freshness to it.