5-Ingredient Almond Pesto
Friends, I’m out of words this week. Getting into the groove of this new school year has been more exhausting than usual, and my brain is finally putting up the stops for a week.
Luckily this week’s recipe really doesn’t need much discussion. You love pesto. I love pesto. The refrigerated pesto at the store is far superior to the jar on the shelf, but it can be $$. Even homemade can be $$ because do you even know how expensive a little jar of pine nuts is? Enter our homeboy, almond.
We make this pesto with basil straight from our garden, but you can buy the basil fresh from the store. If you’re buying the basil I would possibly half or quarter the recipe because my goal here is not for you to spend $15 on herbs alone. We just happen to have a bunch of (ahem, 12) basil plants, so we have plenty of basil throughout the summer and early fall to make this recipe 4-5 times, as well as just have basil when we need it randomly.
I can’t actually believe I’m about to type this because I have a black thumb when it comes to gardening, but do you know how easy it is to grow basil? SO easy. We generally buy 1-2 plants at the beginning of summer, then get more plants from that. You seasoned gardeners probably know this, but basil is a plant that you can put a stalk in water and it will grow new roots. Plant the new rooted stalk, give it a little love, then wham bam you’ve got a new basil plant. We just do that over and over until we have enough or just run out of space (always the second).
A few notes before diving right into the recipe:
- As written, this is very basily. Andy and I prefer it this way, but just add a little less if too much herbiness overwhelms you.
- Don’t get super caught up in measurements here. Pesto is pretty forgiving, so just tweak it until you come up with the proportions that are right for you.
- Olive oil goes a long way towards the thickness or sauciness of the pesto. If you want a thicker pesto, use less. We like to use a full cup because we generally use it with pasta, and the extra olive oil helps the sauce stick to the noodles.
- This makes a lot of pesto, so I generally use half and freeze half for later.
Ingredients:
4 c basil leaves
¾ c almonds
½-3/4 c grated parmesan
1 tsp salt
¾-1 c olive oil
Directions:
- Place basil leaves, almonds, parmesan and salt into a food processor.
- Pulse a few times to get things going.
- Turn the food processor on and slowly add the olive oil through the food chute. Start with ¾ cup, and check for the consistency you want. If you want it “saucier,” add the remaining ¼ cup.
- Enjoy!