Organic Basil Pesto Sauce is easy to make at home and really saves money because buying store pesto is expensive. The pine nuts are not cheap but it’s cheaper to buy the ingredients even if you don’t grow your own basil.

In addition to our herb garden, we dedicated one planter for basil. It produces enough basil for us to enjoy all summer in all our Italian dishes and we make pesto as often as possible. Basil Pesto and Bruschetta are probably the two most popular ways we use our fresh basil out of the garden.

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Making Organic Basil Pesto Sauce begins with growing basil organically or buying organic basil. But we choose to grow it since it’s pretty expensive. In our garden, it’s pretty simple to grow organically since we only have a small contained basil garden. We buy organic basil seeds and start our plants in a seed tray inside before transplanting them in the garden. We don’t use any pesticides on our herb garden nor do we use a weed killer. All weeds are pulled by hand and our plants are carefully checked by hand to remove any harmful pests. And we only use compost for a fertilizer that is made in our home compost bin.

How to Make Organic Basil Pesto Sauce:

Ingredients:

3 cups fresh basil leaves, organic
1/2 cup organic pine nuts
3/4 cup parmesan cheese, shredded
3/4 cup olive oil
4 garlic cloves, minced
salt
black pepper

All you need is a food processor or you can use a blender and basically start throwing in ingredients and blend.

Go ahead and start a pot of water to boil some pasta because as soon as you finish this delicious smelling sauce, you will be looking for some pasta. Enjoy my friends!!

How do you use Basil Pesto:

Serve Basil Pesto:

Spoon organic Basil Pesto over hot pasta, straight or mixed with Alfredo sauce to make Crema Pesto sauce.
Use it as a spread on a panini or baked into bread recipes
mixed with salad dressing and in soups.
Farfalla Pesto Pasta
55 Recipes for Basil

Can you freeze Pesto:

Yes you can freeze basil pesto. Before the first frost, harvest all your herbs except rosemary since it’s an evergreen unless you live in a very harsh climate.

Spoon the pesto into either old fashioned ice trays or use these Silicone Cube Trays (super easy to remove pesto) Place in freezer and freeze overnight.
After freezing the pods of pesto can be popped out and placed in a ziplock bag or freezer container. Then you can use as much or little as needed without defrosting all of it.

These trays could also be used for chicken broth or beef broth, soups or tomato paste or sauce or …. Let us know your ideas in the comments below.

Other Italian Dishes:

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Print Recipe

5 from 4 votes

Organic Basil Pesto

Easy Basil Pesto from organic basil

Prep Time10

Total Time10

Course: Main Course, sauce

Cuisine: Italian

Keyword: basil pesto, organic pesto

Servings:

Calories: 277kcal

Author: Evelyn Osborn

Equipment

Food Processor

Ingredients

3 cups fresh basil leaves organic
1/2 cup organic pine nuts
3/4 cup parmesan cheese shredded
3/4 cup olive oil
4 garlic cloves minced
salt
black pepper

Instructions

Combine basil and pine nuts in a food processor and pulse a few times
Add cheese and garlic, pulse several times more (scrape sides of processor as needed.
With food processor running , slowly pour olive oil in to emulsify (again scrap sides of processor as needed)
Salt and pepper to taste
If not using immediately, place in a tightly sealed container to prevent browning

To Freeze Pesto

Spoon the pesto into either old fashioned ice trays or use this awesome Prepworks Freezer Pod trays Place in freezer and freeze overnight.
After freezing the pods of pesto can be popped out and placed in a ziplock bag or freezer container. Then you can use as much or little as needed without defrosting all of it.