The other day, I realized that I’d been trying so hard to incorporate more ’soul food’ on the daily table, I’d lost track of cooking dishes from other cuisines. This feeling intensified further as I dusted a treasured copy of regional Italian cuisines I picked up during my travels there a few years ago; leading me to pick something to fill the void.

I have often waxed poetic about the culinary haven that is Liguria region of Italy; be it its strikingly apparent love for local produce, rich pestos, or the usage of chestnut flour. There is just something so decadent and luxurious about the region’s cuisine.

Better known of the region’s specialties, perhaps, is the regular (green) pesto. But while summer is still a bit of a ways away, and I like to wait for the peak basil season before filling my kitchen with the heady aroma of basil, garlic and pine nuts being ground together, I wanted to take up the opportunity to try my hand at the other regional pesto, Salsa di Noci or Walnut Sauce (Pesto).

Traditionally, Salsa di Noci is used as the sauce for Pansotti, ravioli stuffed with herbs, ricotta cheese and some seasonal green. But the sauce, or pesto, as I like to think, is so rich and flavorful that it goes with any fresh pasta.

Making ravioli from scratch is something I still have a ways to go before attempting at my kitchen, and I don’t care much for store bought ravioli (so how do I get to enjoy it? Why, when I eat out, of course.), so I decided to try it out with some rice flour pasta.

S and I (or rather, I) have been trying to replace some of the gluten-rich products we consume (no particular reason, except perhaps another attempt at reducing our intake of carbohydrates and increasing that of fiber) with more and more fiber-rich options. While nothing tops fresh, ‘regular’ pasta, the rice flour variety isn’t too bad either. Cooked al dente, it does have a slight flavor to itself as well.

The walnut pesto isn’t too complicated a recipe. And over a couple of tries, I found that the herb that went best with it was marjoram, compared to thyme, and as ever, hiking up the amount of garlic only emphasized the taste.

The original recipe calls for soaked bread slices and cream/milk, but I decided to leave out the bread altogether and use the pasta water as a thinning agent. It worked just as well, leaving the heady aroma of garlic and the walnuts untouched.

The first batch was such a success that I made enough to feed a hungry village and froze it. Ever since, S. and I have been having a go at it every time we pass the freezer; scooping it up with a carrot stick or a bread slice or cracker-or sometimes with just a spoon.