Pesto with roasted potatoes and sirloin steak. Vegan variations of pesto can include mixes of fresh basil, nuts such as walnut or pine nut, olive oil, and the addition of miso paste and nutritional yeast to provide additional flavor enhancement to the dish. For reasons of expense or availability, walnuts, pecans, cashews or even peanuts are sometimes substituted for the traditional pine nuts. Also, while the nuts are traditionally used as is, some recipes call for prior toasting. While not preferable, other culinary nuts may be used due to the taste disturbances that some people may experience after consuming pine nuts
XO sauce in cooking to enhance the flavour of fish, meats, vegetables, and otherwise bland foods such as tofu or noodles. Home cooks often use it as the chief flavouring for fried rice. XO sauce XO sauce is a spicy seafood sauce from Hong Kong. It is commonly used in southern Chinese regions like Guangdong province. Developed in the 1980s in Hong Kong for Cantonese cuisine, XO sauce is made of roughly chopped dried seafoods, including dried scallops ("conpoy"), fish, and shrimp, which are cooked with chili peppers, onions, and garlic. This dried seafood-based sauce resembles the Fujianese Shacha sauce. Spring Moon,