This homemade pesto is rich and herby. Our pesto recipe also shows how easy this “fancy” ingredient is to make! Did we mention it also happens to be vegan? 

THE INGREDIENTS: 

Basil: Pesto and basil go hand-in-hand. In fact, it is the predominant flavor of our-if not every-pesto recipe. Although we use a mixture of basil and parsley, feel free to use all basil in this homemade pesto recipe. Just replace the parsley with basil 1:1. When we say 1 cup of fresh basil, it is also the same thing as one of those 0.8 ounce containers of basil you can buy at the grocery store. So, if you use those, use the whole thing! 

Parsley: Parsley may not be the most traditional ingredient, but it has found itself in many pesto recipes, including ours! It’s light and fresh. It helps to make a pesto that you can eat in large quantities, instead of just being able to have a little dab before it just feels way too strong. Again, if you’d rather not use parsley, just replace this 1:1 with more basil. This is a great recipe for using up leftover parsley, as those fresh bunches you can buy without any packaging at many grocery stores often have more than 1 cup of parsley to them. 

Sunflower Kernels: Well, these aren’t pine nuts, that’s for sure. However, pine nuts are often quite expensive or even hard to find. When we made pesto with pine nuts, we found they didn’t leave any flavor that made them worthy of buying just for one recipe. However, pine nuts do thicken pesto quite well. So, we learned more about sauces, and found other nuts and seeds can thicken up other sauces, such as pesto, just as well. 

If you don’t have sunflower kernels or pine nuts on hand, feel free to reach for just about any nut or seed you have. With that being said, make sure you are using nuts/seeds that are shelled (no shells). Sunflower kernels, for example, are just sunflower seeds with the shell taken off. In addition to that, think of the flavor of each nut. Peanuts will leave a bit of their flavor impact on the pesto, for example. Cashews or almonds, which have a bit lighter of a flavor, will replicate pine nuts a bit more closely. If you don’t mind buying sunflower kernels, just know they also make a wonderful addition to muffins and granolas! 

Salt: We don’t want our pesto to fall flat, do we? A little bit of salt livens everything up without making you desperate to reach for a glass of water. You know your tastes best, so increase or decrease the salt to your own tastes. 

Black Pepper: Black pepper adds a bit of sharpness to this homemade pesto, but the amount is entirely customizable. We recommend not being too heavy handed, as this is not a flavor you want in the forefront-we want the herbs to be the stars! Increase or decrease this black pepper to your own desires, and feel free to use either ground or freshly cracked. We are partial to freshly cracked, but any black pepper works here. 

Garlic Cloves: Pesto was originally made in Italy. What does Italy make you think of? Can we guess you just thought of the Leaning Tower of Pisa? Sincerely, though, you probably also thought about garlic. You’d be spot on with that, as pesto also traditionally is made with garlic cloves crushed right in! We use 1-2 cloves for a slight, but not strong, garlic flavor in our pesto. Increase or decrease as desired. 

Olive Oil (+ Where Is The Parmesan?): We have two moods: minimize oil as much as possible or dump like a whole cup straight into the pot and get cooking! When we were making this recipe, we really wanted to find the minimum amount of oil that could go in homemade pesto. We added 1-2 tablespoons at a time until we hit 8 tablespoons, aka a half cup. We really couldn’t get a successful pesto with less than that. Otherwise, it was more like an herb paste instead of a sauce. If you want to reduce the oil, you’ll have to reduce the sunflower kernels. Be aware, then, that you’ll have a smaller amount of pesto than we make here! 

Also, we use sunflower kernels to thicken our pesto and replace the pine nuts. That leaves the question: but why isn’t parmesan thickening this pesto recipe? Personally, we just like our pesto without. We like cheese, we really do, but we’re not of those who think cheese just makes everything better. In our fridge, we really stick to minimal cheeses and don’t frequently have parmesan on hand-and you all can guess how much we like cooking with what we have! As a bonus, if you’re vegan, this recipe is already all adjusted for you! 

KEY INFORMATION:

Can I Just Add All of the Ingredients at Once and Mix? Nope. If you add all of the liquid at once, the dry ingredients will be suspended in the liquid and not grind as well. Instead, some of the ingredients will just fly around in the liquid. It is better to add the oil slowly, about 2 tablespoons at a time, blending after each addition. This makes sure the other ingredients actually break down when they are processed or ground. 

Can I Use a Food Processor to Make Pesto? Yes, you can! In fact, a food processor is what we go for when making pesto. 

Can I Use a Blender to Make Pesto? Yes, you can! Although a step down from a food processor, a blender still works fine. 

Can I Use a Mortar and Pestle to Make Pesto? Yes, you can! A mortar and pestle does just as good of a job as a food processor, in our opinion. It just takes a touch more strength and a touch more time. 

What Goes With Homemade Pesto? We’re glad you asked! Pesto and pasta is a great combination. It doesn’t just have to be for pasta salad. Feel free to replace our macadamia nut pesto with this pesto in our Hawaiian Gnocchi Recipe. Otherwise, You could even mix pesto into some alfredo sauce for an herby twist on that warm, classic pasta dish. Pesto is a great dip for bread, and it is also great on pizza! Feel free to add it to your sandwiches for lunch or on top of your eggs for breakfast, too. 

How Long Does Pesto Last In The Fridge? 3 days is the answer for that! However, if you want long-term storage, you can freeze your pesto instead.