Make Pesto Yourself: 3 Simple Recipes

In this article, we will show you 3 recipes with which you can easily make pesto yourself. The ingredients listed are sufficient for about 100 ml of pesto.

Make your own pesto: ricotta-pepper pesto

This pesto not only tastes great with pasta but also as a dip for toasted white bread. The preparation is a bit more complicated. Expect a working time of around 20 minutes.

• Have the following ingredients ready: 100g of red peppers, 50g of ricotta, 13g of pine nuts, 20g of Parmesan, and 50ml of extra virgin olive oil. For seasoning, you need salt, pepper, and a few squeezes of lemon juice.
• Wash and quarter the peppers. Grill the pods, skin side up, in the oven at 220°C until black bubbles form on the skin. Peel off the skin after the peppers have cooled.
• Toast the pine nuts in the pan over medium heat. Be careful not to roast the kernels too dark. Small cores burn quickly!
• Blend all the ingredients together in a small blender.

Recipe for the classic: Pesto alla Genovese

The variant with basil as the main ingredient is considered a classic among pestos. To make it yourself, do the following:

• You will need 25g basil leaves, 25g freshly grated parmesan, 20g pine nuts, and 60ml extra virgin olive oil.
• Have ¼ teaspoon of coarse sea salt and 1 clove of garlic ready for seasoning.
• Finely chop the garlic and basil.
• Roast the pine nuts as described in the recipe for the ricotta-paprika pesto.
• Place the basil, pine nuts, garlic, and salt in a blender and blend until smooth.
• Then stir in the parmesan with a spoon.

Homemade pesto with porcini mushrooms

This extraordinary pesto recipe can be made with dried or fresh porcini mushrooms. We will show you the variant with the dried mushrooms, which are available all year round.

• The ingredients for the porcini pesto are: 40 g dried porcini mushrooms, 15 g pine nuts, 25 g Parmesan and 40 ml extra virgin olive oil. Season with salt, pepper, and the juice of half a lemon.
• Soak the dried porcini mushrooms in water. Cut the mushrooms into small pieces and sauté them in the excess mushroom water until all the liquid has evaporated.
• Roast the pine nuts as described in the recipe for the ricotta-paprika pesto.
• As a final step, all the ingredients are mixed together in a container and mashed well.