Creamy chicken pesto pasta recipe (2024)

FAQs

What is creamy pesto made of? ›

What Is Creamy Pesto Made Of? Creamy pesto is basically regular basil pesto with the addition of heavy cream. This makes the sauce a bit milder but much creamier than regular pesto. You'll also need nuts (walnuts or pine nuts work well here), fresh basil, garlic, olive oil, and Parmesan cheese.

A slice of bread goes with pesto pasta. Pair this pasta with Rosemary Olive Oil Bread or No Knead Focaccia. Veggies. Sauteed Zucchini Recipe, Roasted Mushrooms, or Roasted Broccoli and Carrots would be scrumptious paired with this pasta.

Best pasta for pesto

But I do have my preferences. My favourite is penne or ziti (which is just penne with a smooth surface). I find it's the easiest to toss for even distribution and you get the “juiciest” pesto pasta. Spaghetti and other thin(-ish) long strand pastas are my next favourite.

To upgrade your favorite brand of pesto, turn it into a rich cream sauce by sauteing onions, garlic, seasonings, heavy cream, and shredded cheese. You can customize to your tastes by swapping onions for shallots, grated parmesan for shredded asiago, or a sprinkle of fresh herbs.

So, for a standard, single serving of 75g of dried pasta, we think that 50g of pesto is about right. Naturally, everyone's tastes are different, so you'll have to adjust the quantities up or down depending on who you are cooking for. It also greatly depends on what other ingredients you are serving your pasta with.

Yes, pesto can be used straight from the jar and doesn't require cooking or heating. In fact, we actively discourage applying too much heat to pesto, as this will destroy many of the fresh flavours that producers work so hard to retain.

Italian Tradition

Pesto is the perfect sauce to enjoy with a dish of trofie (the traditional Ligurian short pasta), lasagna, potato gnocchi or as a topping for a bowl of minestrone. It can be mixed into tomato sauce to enhance the flavor of pasta dishes or used with fish fillets to make them more appetizing.

You'll want to be mindful of the sodium content. Some jars have more than 500mg per serving and the 2020-2025 Dietary Guidelines recommend you eat no more than 2,300mg per day. It would be hard to stay within those guidelines if you get more than 20% of your sodium from pesto.

Starchy pasta water is used to help thicken and emulsify your pesto, resulting in a silky, restaurant-quality finish. If you've ever wondered why the water you cook your pasta in turns a murky grey, it's because some of the starch from the pasta has leached out.

Should I add pesto to hot pasta? ›

This includes pasta bakes, paninis, pizzas, and many more. Just be aware that exposing pesto to too much heat for too long will change its flavour. Whenever possible, therefore, we add it right at the end of the cooking process to minimise any flavour loss.

The salty, starchy pasta water will loosen the pesto enough to make a light sauce over the pasta. Because of its salty, starchy quality, this water will make a more flavorful, thicker final pesto sauce than regular water would.

You do not need to cook pesto, as its flavours are best enjoyed raw. Instead, allow the residual heat from your freshly cooked pasta to gently warm it as you stir it in. Why is my pesto bland? It's likely because you need to add more basil or salt.

For pesto sauces, use about one jar of 5.6-ounce sauce for a 16-ounce package of pasta. The amount of pesto sauce needed for pasta per person would be about . 75 ounces of sauce for each 2 ounce (about 1 cup cooked) serving of pasta.

Traditional pesto is a blend of fresh basil, garlic, pine nuts, extra-virgin olive oil, and Parmesan cheese. With a food processor, it comes together in just a few steps: Pulse the nuts, lemon juice, and garlic in the food processor until they're finely chopped.

Pesto (Italian: [ˈpesto]) is a paste that traditionally consists of crushed garlic, European pine nuts, coarse salt, basil leaves, and hard cheese such as Parmesan or pecorino sardo (cheese made from sheep's milk), all blended with olive oil. It originated in Genoa, the capital city of Liguria, Italy.

Traditional pesto is a thick, green sauce that tastes bright and herby from the basil, and salty and rich from the cheeses and pine nuts. It should be garlicky, with pleasant grassiness from good quality olive oil.

Pesto is one of the most popular pasta toppings in Italy. It originated in Liguria, specifically in Genoa. This flavorful sauce is made of basil, extra-virgin olive oil, parmesan cheese, pecorino cheese, pine nuts, garlic and salt, traditionally ground in a ceramic or marble mortar.