Basil Pesto with Walnuts

Try making this homemade basil pesto with walnuts for a less expensive and an easy way to use fresh basil from your garden. Full of flavor, takes just 10 minutes to make and you can even freeze it for another day. Use on pasta, veggies, pizza, shrimp, rice and more. An easy and healthy condiment that is low carb too!

You might also like this keto creamy roasted pepper sauce.

I love homemade pesto and I usually make it every summer because we grow so much basil in our herb garden. Today I decide to freeze some for winter and thought I’d share it with you. I made this basil pesto with walnuts instead of the traditional pine nuts to make it less expensive. Pine nuts are expensive and walnuts make a great substitution.

I do this often and the flavor is great. There are so many ways to use this sauce and if you scroll down I share with you some recipes that use pesto. It’s a delicious low carb condiment or sauce and very easy to make.

Recipe ingredients and substitutions.

The simple ingredients I used were fresh basil leaves, extra virgin olive oil, fresh parmesan cheese, walnuts, fresh garlic cloves and salt and black pepper.

• basil leaves – We grow basil in the garden so we make this dish to use some of the vast amount we have. You can easily find fresh basil at grocery stores. Even Aldi has it and some grocery stores carry big bunches of it like Trader Joes. You need fresh basil though and cannot use dried. You can use a mixture of basil and fresh spinach if you don’t have enough.
• parmesan cheese – I like to use fresh grated parmesan cheese so I buy the blog of it and grate it myself. However you can also use already grated parmesan cheese find in the jar or canister if you need to. You can also substitute with pecorino romano cheese.
• garlic cloves – Fresh garlic is pretty important to pesto recipes so I would not substitute with garlic powder.
• olive oil – I like to use a good flavorful extra virgin olive oil if you have it on hand. Otherwise you can a lighter olive oil but it should be olive oil and not a vegetable oil.
• walnuts – I used toasted walnuts as a substitute for pine nuts which are very expensive. Pine nuts are what is normally used but I found that toasting the walnuts is a great substitute for pine nuts. If you want to use pine nuts that’s great too. I have not used any other nuts and I’m not sure they would work except slivered almonds which I often use as a substitute for pine nuts in my pilaf recipes.

Other ways you can play around with the flavor is to add sun dried tomatoes or try some lemon zest and a squeeze of lemon juice. You can add some arugula leaves for a peppery spicy flavor.You can also add some heat with crushed red pepper flakes.

How to make basil pesto with walnuts.

Step 1: First thing you want to do is toast the walnuts. Get out a medium size skillet and heat to medium heat. Add the walnuts halves or pieces and toast for about 5 minutes or so until the just start to brown and are fragrant. When that happens, take the off the stove and place on a plate or paper towel and let cool completely.

Step 2:  Next get out your food processor or high speed blender like a vVtamix blender and add the garlic cloves and basil leaves. Pulse or blend until the both ingredients are chopped well.

Step 3: Next add in the parmesan cheese and the cooled toasted walnuts. Pulse a few times and then add the olive oil and salt and black pepper. Chop until well blended and combined. That’s all there is to it.

Spoon the pesto sauce into an airtight container or bowl. This recipe makes approximately 1 ¾ cups of sauce or 28 tablespoons.

I ended up using some of this to eat with spaghetti squash noodles for a low carb dinner but then froze the rest of it.

Please scroll down to view the printable recipe card.

How to freeze pesto.

There are different ways you can freeze pesto but today I just used a ziplock bag and laid it flat in the freezer. As soon as it freezes you can easy store it in the freeze.

Another way is to put a tablespoon or two into silicone ice cube trays, freeze and then take out and store in a ziplock bag. The thought is you can take a cube or two out to use in recipes. This works well if you just need a couple tablespoons for a recipe.

And of course you can always store in an airtight container and freeze. This is good if you know you meed a larger amount of the sauce. It’s harder to thaw so I would suggest you put in the refrigerator the day before you want to use it.

Ways to use pesto.

There are a lot of different ways you can use basil pesto sauce. Most commonly it’s used with pasta but here are my favorite low carb meals made with it.

• keto turkey pesto burgers
• low carb turnip noodles or with shrimp and spaghetti squash noodles
• keto pesto tilapia
• not low carb but a healthy broccoli pasta salad
• pesto broccoli cauliflower rice (recipe coming soon)

Other ways to use is as a base for pizzas, flatbreads and sandwiches. Use with cooked veggies for a tasty and healthy side dish. Can also use with potatoes, rice, pasta, eggs and even in salad dressing or a marinade for shrimp or chicken. My sister even makes a delicious vegetarian lasagna.

I personally use it with zucchini noodles often in the summer time as we have an abundance of both in our garden.

If you love the flavors of basil, garlic and cheese you could use this sauce to make many different kinds of dishes. Again this homemade basil pesto with walnuts recipe is a great use of fresh basil from your garden or from the summer farmer’s markets. I hope you give it a try and enjoy it as much as we do.

The nutrition information for 1 tablespoon of this homemade basil walnut pesto is 100 calories / 10.8g fat / 0.8g carbs / 0.3g fiber / 1.3g protein = 0.5g net carbs