Artichoke and Olive Tapenade

The other night I cooked artichokes for dinner, and had a whole one left over. I love artichokes, but after having them with dinner two nights in a row (once at a friend's house and once at home), I was feeling a little ho-hum about a third night of plain steamed artichokes. Knowing that I had some crusty bread at home, as well as some lemons, parsley, and garlic, I got some green olives at the grocery store on my way home. The idea: tapenade. No recipe, just throw a bunch of things in the food processor (in this case, my little mini-prep) and adjust the seasonings to taste. It was delicious, especially spread over some toasted bread that had been rubbed with a cut garlic clove. Here are some rough quantities that kind of, sort of amount to a recipe. If you're serving more than one person, I might suggest that you double (or, depending on the number of people, triple) the recipe.

Artichoke and Olive Tapenade
Makes about 2/3 cup

1/2 cup chopped cooked artichoke heart* (make sure to remove the tough outer fibers of the artichoke stem)
1/3 cup chopped green olive
1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
1 tablespoon lemon juice (or more to taste)
extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 teaspoon chopped Italian parsley
salt and pepper to taste

Put the first four ingredients in a food processor and whiz away until the artichoke and olive are finely chopped, if not a paste. Add the oil gradually until the tapenade is the desired consistency (I think I used about 2 tablespoons of oil), and add salt and pepper to taste. Transfer to bowl to serve.

* I've used fresh artichokes here, as that's what I had on hand, and honestly that's what I prefer. You could also make this with canned ones if fresh 'chokes are either out of season or just plain unavailable where you live.