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The pesto sauce is delicious or not. Pesto sauce - a homemade recipe, what it is eaten with and what to serve

Sauces are quite laborious for many to prepare. In addition, there is not always time for experiments, but to please loved ones delicious dish really want to.

The classic recipe for Pesto pasta offers us a great option for both family dinner, and as a treat for a group of friends gathered at the festive table. We will show you how to prepare the classic Pesto pasta with ready-made sauce. This will save you time, but will not affect the taste of the dish!

To make Pesto pasta at home, we need:

  • pasta hard varieties 400 BC You can change the amount of ingredients depending on how many servings of the dish you want. 400 grams of the product is enough for 2-3 servings of pasta. We advise you to use exactly italian spaghetti or pasta for pasta of a different shape, they are ideal for this dish.
  • Pesto sauce 3 tbsp The amount of the ingredient can be changed to your liking. A quality sauce won't be cheap. When choosing an ingredient, pay attention to the price and composition. It should be free from synthetic harmful components, flavor enhancers and other additives.
  • Parmesan cheese, or if you can't find it, use Grana Padano cheese;
  • olive oil 1 tbsp;
  • salt ½ tbsp;
  • optional cherry tomatoes and basil leaves for decoration.

How to make Pesto Pasta? A recipe with a photo from the site will help you and prove that delicious dishes are easy!

1. The first step is to boil the pasta, according to the recommendations indicated on the package. Remember to cook the pasta in a large enough saucepan. We also recommend adding a little more salt than usual, but don't overdo it.

2. 5 minutes after the start of cooking, taste the pasta, add salt if necessary. If there is too much of it, rinse it after cooking.

3. Now, with the help of a sieve, merge the water (broth) from the finished pasta.

But be sure to leave 150-200 ml of this broth.

4. Next, add olive oil, salt, if necessary, and a little grated Parmesan to the pasta, while they are still hot. Under the influence of temperature, it will melt perfectly and add a wonderful taste to the finished dish. We also pour in the left broth to the pasta. We mix them. There should be some liquid at the bottom of the container, but not excessively, they should not literally float in it. Now the pasta will be fluffy, crumbly and juicy. This is the secret of the famous Italian pastas!

5. Place the pasta in serving bowls. Put the desired amount of sauce in each portion and mix the pasta. Be sure to spread the grated Parmesan on top. You can also garnish the dish with basil leaves or cherry tomatoes. Pesto is ready to serve!

Pasta is a wonderful tasty and aromatic dish that will perfectly saturate the body. Even people who follow a diet or principle proper nutrition, can sometimes afford hard pasta. Thanks to these characteristics, the paste is an ideal exquisite dish for any occasion.

Enjoy your meal!

Information

Recipe name:

Pesto Pasta

Alexandra

Italian classic sauce basil pesto is a great addition to boiled pasta, pizza, or. It is prepared quite simply, and if you use a blender instead of a mortar, the whole process will take a few minutes.

Pesto is refreshing, slightly spicy taste and stands out for its pronounced green color, which will surely add originality to any Italian dish.

Ingredients:

  • green basil - a bunch (about 30-40 g);
  • olive oil - about 50 ml;
  • Parmesan cheese (or any hard cheese) - 50 g;
  • pine nuts - 30 g;
  • garlic - 2-3 teeth.

Classic pesto sauce at home

How to make pesto sauce in a mortar

  1. To pine nuts acquired a more pronounced taste and rich aroma, fry them in a dry frying pan over moderate heat. There is no need to bring the nuts to darkening - it takes only 2-3 minutes of frying, during which the kernels must be constantly mixed.
  2. We wash the basil with cold water and dry it, then we cut off all the green leaves - the stems will not be useful to us. There are two ways to prepare pesto sauce - in a blender and in a marble mortar. The first option is faster - all ingredients are placed in the blender bowl and simply chopped until smooth. However, the second method is considered more "correct", classical. Therefore, if you have time, we advise you to give preference to it.
  3. Put clean and dry basil leaves in a mortar and knead them in a green "gruel" in a circular motion. Add toasted and cooled nuts.
  4. Cheese room temperature rub with fine shavings and load into a mortar. Next, squeeze out the peeled garlic cloves.
  5. We continue to grind the mass into the most homogeneous paste. Gradually pour in the olive oil. Do not forget that pesto is just a sauce, not a thin soup or thick porridge, so the dosage of oil is varied taking into account the resulting consistency. We remove the sample, add salt if necessary.

Serving classic pesto sauce to boiled pasta, pizza, or simply spread on slices of fresh bread. Bon Appetit!

The popular Mediterranean pesto sauce is easy to make at home. In modern realities, it is prepared using kitchen units with a cutting device: a meat grinder or blender, and original way Making pesto involves grinding the ingredients by hand in a mortar. Basil, olive oil, parmesan cheese and garlic are the main ingredients of the traditional sauce, but today there are many variations using different products. As for the use of pesto in cooking, it is the broadest. Green sauce added to pasta (pasta), spread on bread, poured over fish and meat.

Traditional Italian pesto

Cooking time: 15 minutes.

Quantity: 370 BC

it basic recipe pesto sauce at home, which can be modified if desired and with some culinary experience. Before preparing the sauce, the main emphasis should be on the choice of products: the basil should be fresh with intact, undamaged leaves, and pine nuts should not be bitter.

Ingredients

Servings: - + 1

  • Pine nuts 100 g
  • Fresh basil 100 g
  • Parmesan cheese 100 g
  • Olive oil 100 ml
  • Garlic 3 cloves
  • Salt and ground pepper to taste

15 minutes. Seal

The prepared sauce can be stored in a sealed container in the refrigerator for up to 3 weeks.

Pesto sauce with sun-dried tomatoes


This variation of the Italian pesto sauce favorably complements the taste of the pasta, but tomato pesto also goes well with many other dishes. Tomatoes can be dried on their own or you can use a ready-made store product.

Ingredients:

  • 1 bunch of basil
  • 200 g sun-dried tomatoes.
  • 80 g of cedar nuts.
  • 70 g parmesan.
  • 120 ml of olive oil.
  • 2 cloves of garlic.

Cooking process:

  1. Chop sun-dried tomatoes in a blender. If you are going to carry out the drying process yourself, get ready for a long wait: it takes about 6 hours to dry tomatoes in the oven, and even more in the dryer. But you can use baked tomatoes instead of dried ones - at medium temperature they are baked for 1-1.5 hours. Of course, the store option will greatly speed up the process of making pesto.
  2. Put the chopped tomatoes in a separate bowl.
  3. Place pine nuts in a blender and grind them to the size you need. The sauce of a delicate consistency goes well with pasta, and with dense splashes it serves as a delicious spread on bread.
  4. Grate the parmesan and, along with the garlic, send it to the blender for the nuts.
  5. Wash the basil, dry the leaves and separate them from the branches, pour into a blender. Pass everything together through the cutting tool of the blender.
  6. Add olive oil and sun-dried tomatoes to the bowl, turn on the blender for a few seconds and skip the entire list of ingredients.

Pesto sauce with sun-dried tomatoes is often used to grease pizza, added to risotto.

Pesto sauce with basil and rucola for the winter


Pesto sauce can last relatively long in the refrigerator and reliably keep fresh in the freezer for several months. Arugula in this recipe gives not only a pronounced flavor, in its leaves there is mustard oil, which is famous for its preservative properties.

Ingredients:

  • 1 bunch of basil
  • 1 bunch of arugula
  • 150 ml of olive oil.
  • 60 g of pine nuts.
  • Salt.
  • 2 cloves of garlic.
  • Hard cheese (for a recipe that involves keeping the sauce in the freezer).

Cooking process:

  1. Grind washed and dried basil and arugula leaves in a blender. Do not allow the stems of these herbaceous plants to get into the sauce, as they give too bitter taste and can ruin the dish.
  2. Add pine nuts, garlic to the chopped herbs in a blender and chop everything together. If you are going to store the sauce in the refrigerator, add more garlic.
  3. Mix the chopped ingredients together and season with salt. When storing by freezing, add olive oil and, optionally, grated cheese at this stage. Mix everything, put in portioned bags, making sure that no air remains in them, and send the sauce to the freezer.
  4. If the sauce will be stored in jars in the refrigerator, then after adding salt to the chopped ingredients, transfer it to sterile jars, pour it over with olive oil and seal it with lids. You cannot add cheese at the same time.

In the refrigerator, the sauce in jars can be stored for a month, and frozen - for 3-4 months.

Pesto with green peas, pistachios and mint


This recipe is far from the traditional Italian pesto with basil and pine nuts. But since "pesto" means "crushed" or "chopped", then this sauce has the right to be called that. Moreover, it also turns out green, and it uses olive oil.

Ingredients:

  • Green peas - 250 g.
  • Peeled pistachios - 50 g.
  • Olive oil - 150-200 ml.
  • Parmesan (optional)
  • Garlic - 2-3 cloves.
  • Mint leaves - 5 branches.
  • Salt.

Cooking process:

  1. Fresh green pea toss in boiling water and boil for 3 minutes. Defrost frozen peas beforehand.
  2. Place the peas in a colander and rinse immediately with cold water to maintain a brighter color.
  3. Place pistachios in a blender bowl and chop not very finely.
  4. Add garlic to pistachios, then washed and dried mint leaves.
  5. Grate the cheese. You can do without it, then you get a sauce of exclusively vegetable composition. If you use Parmesan, then grated it should also be sent to a blender.
  6. Add boiled peas and half a serving of olive oil to the ingredients, chop everything together with a blender.
  7. Put the resulting homogeneous mass on a plate, pour in the remaining oil, salt if necessary.

This sauce is not for long-term storage, so enjoy it immediately by spreading it on toasted bread or adding to Italian pasta.

Spinach pesto sauce


Spinach pesto sauce differs from the traditional one by the presence of sourness in the taste and a more viscous consistency, since the spinach leaves are boiled before chopping. Otherwise, the ingredients are the same as in traditional pesto. This sauce goes best with pasta.

Ingredients:

  • 300 g fresh spinach.
  • 50 g of pine nuts.
  • 100 g parmesan.
  • 100 ml of olive oil.
  • 2 cloves of garlic.
  • Salt and lemon juice optional.
  • 1 spoon of milk.

Cooking process:

  1. Rinse spinach, put in cold water and after boiling, boil for just a minute. Then drain the water, rinse the spinach leaves and refill with cold water with the addition of a spoonful of milk. Let it boil and discard the spinach in a colander.
  2. Fry pine nuts in a pan without adding oil. Cool and pass through a blender or chop with a knife.
  3. Chop the peeled garlic cloves with a knife and fry a little in a pan with a spoonful of olive oil, being careful not to overexpose so that the garlic does not taste bitter.
  4. Combine cooled garlic and chopped pine nuts.
  5. Mash the Parmesan well with a fork and mix with olive oil, and then add the nuts and garlic, beat everything with a fork or mixer until an airy mass is obtained.
  6. Grind the cooled spinach in a blender or meat grinder.
  7. Combine all the ingredients, mix well, if desired, you can process them again with a mixer. You can add a few drops to the sauce to taste lemon juice, salt and pepper.

Using the sauce as a pasta addition, you can sprinkle the whole dish with extra Parmesan.

Italian cuisine is famous for its sauces. However, to enjoy the great taste of pesto, you don't have to go to Italy or a restaurant. European cuisine... Everyone can make this sauce on their own.

It is believed that pesto sauce first appeared in the Roman Empire, however, the first documentary evidence that mentions the preparation of this sauce dates back to the middle of the 19th century. Most often, the sauce is served with pasta, used during cooking soups, some even spread it on bread and crackers. There are many variations of pesto, but there are 3 ingredients found in every recipe- this, basil and cheese. Traditionally, the color of the sauce is green, but if you put in it during cooking sun-dried tomatoes then it will turn red.

Pesto sauce. Classic recipe

You will need:

  • basil - 1 bunch
  • garlic - 1 clove
  • pine nuts - 40 grams,
  • parmesan cheese - 50 grams,
  • salt to taste
  • olive oil - 7 teaspoons.

Cooking method

  • My basil. We dry it. We cut it coarsely.
  • Peel the pine nuts from the shells.
  • Grate the cheese.
  • We mix all the ingredients, add the olive oil.
  • Grind in a mortar.
  • Add a little salt if necessary. We mix. The sauce is ready!

The classic way to make pesto sauce is to grind the ingredients in a mortar, but to save time and effort, you can mix the ingredients in a blender. It is this method that is currently used not only by housewives, but even by chefs of Italian restaurants.

Parsley and cilantro pesto

You will need:

  • cilantro - 2/3 bunch,
  • parsley - 1/3 bunch,
  • parmesan - 50 grams (can be replaced with any hard cheese),
  • pine nuts - 30 grams (if necessary, you can use pistachios or cashews instead),
  • olive oil - 100 ml,
  • salt to taste.

Cooking method

  • Rinse the greens. We dry it. Separate the leaves from the stems. Chop coarsely.
  • We clean the garlic. Cut into slices.
  • Grate the cheese.
  • Put some of the herbs, cheese, nuts and garlic in a blender.
  • Add some olive oil.
  • Grind the ingredients, gradually adding the remaining herbs and oil to the mass. It is not at all necessary to grind the sauce to homogeneous mass, it is enough just to connect and chop the food a little. Ready!

Arugula pesto

You will need:

  • arugula - 2 bunches,
  • peeled green pistachios - 1/3 cup,
  • olive oil - 1/4 cup,
  • haciago cheese - 50 grams,
  • lemon zest - 2 teaspoons
  • lemon juice - 1 tablespoon,
  • salt to taste.

Video recipe for the occasion:

Cooking method

  • My rocolla. We dry it.
  • Rub the cheese on a fine grater.
  • We clean the garlic. Grind in a blender.
  • Add cheese and pistachios. Grind.
  • Add rucolla leaves and lemon zest.
  • Pour in lemon juice. Grind to a pasty mass.
  • Whisking continuously, add olive oil to the sauce.
  • Salt and pepper. Add a little more lemon juice if necessary. Mix thoroughly. We remove the sauce in a cool place, after a couple of hours it is ready for use.

Sun-dried tomato and walnut pesto

You will need:

  • basil - 1 bunch
  • sun-dried tomatoes - 6 pieces,
  • garlic - 1 clove
  • parmesan cheese - 50 grams,
  • chopped walnuts - 1/3 cup,
  • olive oil - 1/3 cup,
  • water - 2 tablespoons,
  • sea ​​salt - 1/2 teaspoon,
  • freshly ground black pepper - 1/4 teaspoon.

Cooking method

  • We clean the garlic. Chop finely.
  • My basil. We dry it. Separate the leaves from the stems.
  • Grate the cheese.
  • Cut the sun-dried tomatoes.
  • We put all of the above in the bowl of the combine.
  • We pour in water.
  • Salt and pepper.
  • Grind until smooth, gradually pouring in olive oil. As soon as the pesto acquires the consistency of a thick paste, turn off the blender, transfer the sauce to glass jar and we can take a sample.

Asparagus and pistachio pesto

You will need:

  • green asparagus - 200 grams,
  • fresh spinach leaves - 100 grams,
  • parmesan cheese - 50 grams,
  • garlic - 1 clove
  • olive oil - 3 tablespoons,
  • peeled pistachios - 2 tablespoons,
  • lemon juice - to taste,
  • salt to taste.

Cooking method

  • Boil the asparagus in boiling water. We rinse. Cut into small pieces.
  • My spinach. We dry it. We chop.
  • We clean the garlic.
  • Grate the cheese.
  • Combine the prepared ingredients in a blender, adding olive oil and lemon juice.
  • Salt and grind until smooth. Italian sauce ready!

Mayonnaise pesto

You will need:

  • basil - 1/2 bunch
  • vegetable oil - 2 cups,
  • olive oil - 2 tablespoons,
  • mustard - 1 teaspoon
  • white wine vinegar - 1 teaspoon,
  • egg yolk - 2 pieces,
  • salt to taste.

Cooking method

  • My basil. For a quarter of a minute, immerse it in boiling water, and then put it in ice water and discard it in a colander.
  • We grind the basil leaves freed from excess moisture in a blender together with olive oil for a couple of minutes. We transfer the resulting mass to a bowl.
  • Beat the yolks, vinegar and mustard in a blender, gradually pouring in vegetable oil.
  • After the mass begins to resemble mayonnaise, add a little water. We mix. The sauce should pour.
  • Add basil to mayonnaise, add a little salt and mix thoroughly. Mayonnaise pesto is ready to eat!

Lemon pesto

You will need:

  • basil - 4 bunches,
  • peeled pine nuts - 100 grams,
  • grated parmesan cheese - 100 grams,
  • garlic - 3 cloves,
  • lemon - 1/2 piece,
  • olive oil - 4 tablespoons,
  • ground black pepper - to taste,
  • sea ​​salt to taste.

Cooking method

  • We clean the garlic. Grind.
  • Grate the cheese.
  • Grind cheese, garlic and pine nuts in a blender.
  • My basil. We dry it. Chop coarsely. We send it to the garlic-cheese-nut mass and continue to beat.
  • Add lemon juice and olive oil. Beat for a couple of minutes.
  • Salt and pepper. We mix.
  • Transfer the lemon pesto to a vase and serve. Bon Appetit!

What can they do, these pasta: pizza and pasta? Objection! Italians can be tirelessly praised for having invented the tastiest, and therefore: pesto. Thanks to this delicate spicy addition, even the simplest dish will acquire a charming Mediterranean

smack and unforgettable aroma.

Pesto traditions

It is absolutely known that classic recipe pesto has been around for over 200 years. The famous Ligurian sauce is made with olive oil, basil, pine nuts and hard cheese... Other ingredients may vary, which we will definitely talk about next. But there is one point that should be taken into account if you want to cook everything according to the rules - according to the old Italian tradition pesto is prepared with a marble mortar and wooden pestle - not otherwise. By the way, the verb pestare in Italian means “to trample, rub, crush” (compare with the Russian pestle), hence the name “pesto”. But if time is precious to you, you can use a blender or mixer.

Classics and improvisation

The classic pesto - Pesto alla genovese (Genoese pesto) is made with basil grown around Genoa, salt, pine seeds, garlic, extra virgin Ligurian olive oil and hard sheep's cheese. But this, of course, is not the only recipe pesto, found in Italy. For example, in Sicily, Pesto alla siciliana is prepared - without nuts, but with tomatoes. And in the area of ​​the Gulf of Naples, they prefer Pesto alla trapanese - with sun-dried tomatoes and almonds, but no cheese.

Pesto can also be with walnuts, hazelnuts, peanuts, arugula, spinach, dill or mint ... So don't be afraid to deviate from tradition! first spin.

What do they eat it with?

Any pesto goes perfectly with the most different kinds italian pasta and with ravioli. Try! Pesto magically turns a completely ordinary side dish into a delicious stand-alone dish: you can serve rice and vegetable mixes steamed.

It is also worth baking fish with pesto sauce, for this Italians most often use cod and salmon - it will turn out very tasty.

Cod with pesto sauce. Make a rucola pesto with purple basil. Take 500 g of cod fillet. Lightly grease vegetable oil baking dish. Salt and pepper one side of the fillet, then place in a mold. Brush the top with pesto sauce. Place the dish in an oven preheated to 200 ° C. After 15 minutes, the fish is ready.

In pesto sauce, meat chops or turkey. Meat or poultry baked in the oven in foil can be safely made the main dish on festive table! Grilled lamb will be tender and juicy if smeared with pesto before cooking. And dried pork underneath will sparkle with new flavors.

Of vegetables, the sauce goes best with eggplant and bell pepper especially if it's tomato pesto. Another traditional Italian yummy, where you can't do without pesto, is a multi-layered vegetable pie, each layer of which is smeared with a magic sauce.

Vegetable Pesto Pie. Take a classic pesto sauce, 1 red onion, a glass of green peas, 2 carrots, 1 zucchini, 50 g parmesan and 400 g ready-made puff pastry. Cut the zucchini into half circles, the onion into half rings, the carrots into circles. Roll out the dough into a layer 3 mm thick. Puncture it frequently with a fork. Spread the vegetables in layers, each brushing the pesto. Sprinkle the top layer with grated cheese and bake in an oven preheated to 190 ° C for 20 minutes.

Pesto is often used in canapes, sandwiches and sandwich cakes, as well as tomato, ham and cheese pizzas. Risotto with spinach, warm salad with seafood - all this would not be so delicious without pesto. In Italy, they even put it in soups!

Alternatively, you can simply spread the pesto on a slice of fresh bread. But before you try it, savoring the spicy flavor that comes from such a sandwich is also part of the fun!

You have already seen that there are a lot of pesto recipes. Be sure to try them all to choose your favorite.

It is believed that pesto has been known since Roman times, but the first documentary evidence of the preparation of this sauce dates back to 1865.

With their sauce, they even organized the Genoese pesto world championship! It is interesting that along with professional chefs, amateur cooks take part in this competition.

V different countries There are delicious, but rather strange analogues of Italian pesto in the world. For example, in French Provence, they prepare pistou sauce (fr. Pistou), which is usually not added to nuts. In Austria, they like pesto from pumpkin seeds, and in Germany, wild garlic is used instead of basil.

Italians definitely include pesto in their wedding menu, because pesto is not only a symbol of a rich table, but also just a good sign for newlyweds!

Green pesto

Ingredients

Basil - 60 g



Grated sheep cheese - 2 tbsp. spoons

Garlic - 2 cloves



Olive oil - 100 ml

Salt to taste

Grind pine nuts (or pine seeds), garlic, cheese in a blender or using a marble mortar.

Add salt and gradually dilute the resulting mass with cold-pressed olive oil until the consistency of sour cream.

Green pesto is considered a classic. It goes perfectly with all types of pasta, minestrone or risotto. Green pesto better than others will emphasize the taste of caprese - a classic Italian snack made from mozzarella and tomatoes.

Red pesto

Ingredients

Basil - 20 g

Pine seeds or pine nuts - 3 tbsp. spoons

Garlic - 2 cloves

Grated Parmesan - 3 tbsp spoons

Sun-dried tomatoes - 100 g

Capers - 1 tbsp spoon

Balsamic vinegar - 1 tbsp spoon

Olive oil - 100 ml

Salt to taste

In a blender (at low speed), grind basil, pine nuts or pine seeds, garlic, cheese and sun-dried tomatoes. Add capers and balsamic vinegar... Dilute with olive oil to the desired consistency.

Red sauce is great not only for pasta, but also for tender cream cheese... It will perfectly complement the taste of grilled meat, as well as baked vegetables, especially eggplants.

Yellow pesto

Ingredients

Basil - 20 g

Pine seeds or pine nuts - 3 tbsp. spoons

Shredded walnuts- 1 tbsp. spoon

Garlic - 2 cloves

Grated Parmesan - 3 tbsp spoons

Ricotta - 150 g

Olive oil - 100 ml

Salt to taste

Basil, pine seeds, walnuts, cheese, ricotta chop in a blender, add salt and olive oil.

Yellow sauce makes a unique taste vegetable soups(pumpkin, carrot, with sesame and ginger), and it is absolutely irreplaceable in the recipe of the famous avocado cream soup.

Purple pesto

Ingredients

Rucola - 100 g

Purple basil - 2 sprigs

Pine nuts - 2 tbsp spoons

Garlic - 1 clove

Olive oil - 1 tbsp spoon

Melted butter- 1 tbsp. spoon

Salt to taste

Chop arugula, basil and garlic in a blender. Without turning off the blender, pour in the olive oil. Add melted butter, stir and sprinkle with pine nuts.

The purple sauce goes well with fish and seafood. Even ordinary potatoes baked with pesto will become unusual. It is also used in baked spinach mushrooms.