Pesto Trapanese with Gnocchi

An amazing fresh tomato pesto sauce you can enjoy with any pasta or gnocchi … recipe just slightly adapted from Linda’s Italian Cuisine

I’m not quite done with the tomato recipes yet … I hope you still have a few fresh garden tomatoes left yet to make this one because it is SO good and it’s incredibly simple too! It’s a delightful recipe I discovered from my foodie friend Linda’s Italian Cuisine. I have tried a few of her recipes and every one I’ve tried has been totally fabulous. Of course I usually have to put my own little spin on the recipe … with this one, I really didn’t do much at all. The only change I made was to cut the olive oil in half … oh and I also had to substitute Parmesan for Pecorino cheese (it’s what I had on hand!) and I used a small hunk of fresh hot cowhorn pepper in place of the dried red pepper, because hey, if you’ve got fresh hot peppers, well, why use dried ones?

I was talking to my dad tonight (because my son wants me to make “grampa’s bread” and I needed to get an update on what he’s been doing with his bread lately, but that’s totally another topic for another day …) and Dad asked me if I’ve used up all the garden produce I gathered while I was there. Well, I had to give him an update, so I mentioned all the tomatoes I’ve canned and then the two sauces I’ve made. When I mentioned the fresh tomato pesto, he said “Wait, TOMATO PESTO?!?” Yep, tomato pesto. I told him about the Sundried Tomato Pesto I’ve made before (thanks to The Foodie Physician for introducing me to that one!), but this new FRESH tomato pesto sauce, this is not so super-thick and pasty like pesto normally is. It’s more of a pasta sauce consistency … so it’s totally easy to toss it with your pasta or gnocchi or zoodles or lasagna or whatever else you might want to toss it with. It would also be marvelous as a base sauce for pizza. It’s uber simple to make. All you do is blend it up and it’s ready to go.

Pesto Trapanese with Gnocchi

• Prep Time: 10 minutes
• Cook Time: 15 minutes
• Total Time: 25 minutes
• Yield: Almost 1 quart of sauce 1x

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Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

• 1 to 1 1/3 lb. fresh garden tomatoes (whatever tomatoes you’ve got ripe from the garden) … or substitute canned tomatoes in a pinch
• Gnocchi or pasta or zucchini noodles
• 1 cup almonds – skins on are fine – toast them a little to bring out the flavor!
• 2 fresh garlic cloves, peeled
• 1 cup (slightly packed) fresh basil leaves
• 1 small chunk of hot pepper or 1/4 teaspoon Red Pepper Flakes
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan (or Pecorino) Cheese

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Instructions

1. Fill a large saucepan with water and heat to boiling. Put each tomato in the boiling water for about 20 sec, then remove from water. When the tomatoes are cool enough to touch, pull the peels off the tomatoes and cut the cores out and cut them into chunks. Weigh them after you’ve peeled/cored them. Put your tomato chunks in the blender.
2. Once you’ve got enough tomatoes for your sauce, start your pasta or gnocchi cooking in the boiling water.
3. Put the tomatoes in a blender with the rest of the ingredients. Blend until smooth.
4. When the pasta is done, toss it with some of the sauce. Garnish with fresh shredded parmesan and basil (and capers, if you like). Put the rest of the sauce in a covered jar in the fridge for later.

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Notes

RECIPE SOURCE: http://www.sumptuousspoonfuls.com/

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This recipe was shared at The Wednesday Roundup, Foodie Friends Friday and Moonlight & Mason Jars.