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Best Pesto Recipe – Easy and Homemade Pesto Recipe that will transform any dish. Made with fresh herbs like basil, parsley and cilantro. Keep on reading and we’ll tell you how to make pesto!
Best Pesto Recipe
This homemade pesto recipe is insanely easy to make! It’s delicious and the best way to transform a boring dish! Pesto goes great with chicken, on keto pizza, zoodles, and even top a salad!
On a non-traditional note – we also love to use this homemade pesto sauce as a dip! We sometimes whip up a batch of homemade parmesan cheese crisps and dip them in the pesto sauce!
What is pesto?
Pesto is a sauce that was first made in Genoa, Italy. Traditionally pesto is made with fresh basil, olive oil, garlic, pine nuts and Parmesan cheese.
In authentic fashion, the pesto should be crushed with a mortar and pestle. But nowadays most recipes online say to blend it. If we break down the term “pesto,” it actually means “to crush” in the Genoese dialect.
Pesto Ingredients
What’s in pesto? There are so many ways to make pesto. Some include only basil, others only cilantro. And others include a combination of herbs. There are even nut free pesto recipes and dairy free pesto recipes!
- Fresh basil
- Fresh cilantro
- Fresh parsley
- Garlic
- Extra-virgin olive oil
- Pine nuts
- Parmesan cheese
- Salt
How to make pesto
Making pesto is so easy! You’ll never by store-bought again!
First you need to grab a blender or food processor. Then add the basil, parsley, cilantro, garlic, and olive oil to the blender or food processor.
Next you’ll need to blend and pulse until it forms a chunky paste. After that, add the pine nuts, parmesan cheese, and salt and process until smooth (or leave a little texture if you prefer).
Finally serve, or store in a glass container in the fridge for up to 2 days.
Freezing pesto is an option too if you don’t use it all up. Simply pour leftovers into an ice cube tray and
freeze for up to 3 months.
Pesto Calories – our pesto recipe contains 81 calories per tablespoon.
How do you make good pesto?
We believe that a pesto sauce must most importantly be made with FRESH HERBS! It doesn’t have to be isolated to 1 herb (we use a combo of 3!). You can swap out the pine nuts for another nut like walnuts or pecans and you can swap the parmesan cheese for any other hard cheese.
What is the best pesto sauce in a jar?
If you don’t have time to make a homemade pesto recipe, simply pick up one of these at Walmart, Publix, Trader Joe’s, WholeFoods or Amazon.
- Blue Moose Basil Pesto
- Giusto Basil Pesto
- Classico Basil Pesto
- ROI Imported Italian Ligurian Pesto Sauce
- Alessi Pesto
- Filippo Classic Pesto
If you like this pesto sauce recipe, check out these other low carb sauces and dressings
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Best Pesto Recipe
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups basil, parsely, and cilantro very tightly packed basil
- 1 large clove garlic peeled
- ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
- ¼ cup pine nuts toasted and cooled
- ¼ cup Parmesan cheese freshly-grated
- ⅛ teaspoon salt
Instructions
- Add the herbs, garlic, and olive oil to a blender and pulse until it forms a chunky paste.
- Add the pine nuts, Parmesan cheese, and salt and process until smooth (or leave a little texture if you prefer).
- Serve, or store in a glass container in the fridge for up to 2 days or pour into an ice cube tray and
- freeze for up to 3 months.
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