Fresh Homemade Basil Pesto Recipe

This Fresh Homemade Basil Pesto Recipe is so simple and delicious! Made with fresh herbs and pine nuts. I am going to be making this all summer long!

This Fresh Homemade Basil Pesto has an amazing flavor combination of the basil, parmesan, and pine nuts.  I know some people use different nuts when making pesto because they are not the cheapest nut, but if you want that true authentic pesto flavor you have got to use the pine nuts!  I got my pine nuts from the bins at Winco and they weren’t too expensive and totally worth it.
I am especially proud of this batch of pesto because I made it with my own home grown basil from my little italian herb garden!  This was my first time growing herbs and I am absolutely loving it.  It’s been much easier than I thought to take care of it.  I have been using these fresh herbs in a lot of my cooking and the flavors are so much better than the dried stuff.  We made our Rosemary Tri-Tip on Sunday with the fresh rosemary and it was awesome!
Here is a pic of when I first started my little garden and what it looks like now, just one month later.  It’s growing like crazy!  The funny thing too was that I took this picture after I cut down my basil plants to make the pesto (which I used 2 cups of packed leaves), so you can just imagine how big the basil was before this picture!
We love pesto and use it in tons of our recipes!  I love it spread on sourdough toast like the picture above but here are a few more recipes you need some delicious ideas:

Turkey Pesto Croissant Sandwiches
Grilled Pesto Pizzas
Gourmet Steak Sandwiches
Margherita Grilled Cheese Sandwiches
Homemade Pesto Rolls
BAM Sammys
Stuffed Pesto Chicken
Pesto Potatoes

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Fresh Homemade Pesto Recipe

Ingredients (with Amazon Links)

• 2 cups basil leaves packed
• 1 tsp. minced garlic
• 1/4 c. pine nuts
• 1/4 c. parmesan cheese
• 1/2 c. olive oil
• 1/4 tsp. kosher salt
• pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Put all ingredients in a food processor and blend until mostly smooth.
2. For sandwiches, we love pesto mayo (2 parts mayo to one part pesto)
3. Pesto can be frozen for later use.