Sorta Pesto Pasta

I am not the best photographer.

It's been rainy, dark and chilly down right cold since spring came to Wisconsin. I need a pick me up, a taste of spring or summer. Plus I've got a whole bunch of basil that is at the eat it or lose it stage of the game soooo...PESTO! (like presto get it? Lame I know). I got a pretty rad deal on cashews at my local Indian grocery so instead of pine nuts in this I'm using cashews, not to mention pine nuts are forkin' expensive and I'm not made of money here!  I read something like this (though it was not vegan) in a magazine where they used parsley instead of basil so you could do that if you wanted. Anyways if anyone out there on the interwebs reads this I hope you enjoy!

Sorta Pesto Pasta

1 pint  cherry or grape tomatoes cut in half*
1/2 C  olive oil
2 C. or so of Basil (roughly chopped)
1/4 C roasted cashews
1/4 C faux parm (recipe follows or use what you like best)
1-2 cloves of garlic depending on your love of garlic
lemon juice (from prob. half a lemon or more to taste)
A box of pasta (a pound would be too much so if you're using a pound box leave some out)
S & P
dash of oregano (completely optional)
Preheat 375
Combine those tomatoes with olive oil (around 1 1/2 T)  salt and pepper and a dash of oregano (If you want. I happen to love oregano and try to put it on everything ,do not sweat it if you don't have it) and put them on a cookie sheet and roast em til they start looking like grandpa (wrinkly) about 11-12 minutes.
Cook your pasta according to the directions, strain and put a little olive oil with it, put a lid on it and keep it warm and snug.
Combine the cashews, basil, lemon juice and faux parm in the food processor and pulse until well combined then turn the processor on low and stream in the olive oil, process until it looks like, well... pesto.
Now you have all the suspects, mix them all together and TA DA dinner!

 Notes on this recipe- I would highly recommend that you use a spiral-type pasta for this I used angel hair and was not too happy about it.
I felt like it could use a lot more tomatoes, so eat em if you got em!

*If you have more tomatoes by all means use them, this is what I had in my fridge.

Sorta Parm (this comes from vegan on the cheap GREAT book)
1/2 C nut or seed of choice (I like cashew pieces or slivered almonds for this)
3 T nutritional yeast
1/2 t salt

Put it all in the food processor and pulse until it is all combined with no big chunks.
If you are using whole nuts I would suggest  following the actual recipe and pulsing the nuts (not too much or you will make cashew paste) then stirring in the yeast and salt.