Beetroot Pesto Spaghetti Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What pairs well with pesto pasta? ›

Veggies. Sauteed Zucchini Recipe, Roasted Mushrooms, or Roasted Broccoli and Carrots would be scrumptious paired with this pasta. Meatballs. Turkey Meatballs or Chicken Meatballs would be ideal for a protein addition.

As a very rough guide, your pesto should weigh about 2/3 the weight of the dried pasta you are cooking. So, for a standard, single serving of 75g of dried pasta, we think that 50g of pesto is about right.

Similar to oil-based sauces, pesto is served best with longer cuts of pasta, like the corkscrew shape of Fusilli. Pesto works best with Bucatini, Capellini, thinner Spaghettini, and Fettuccine.

Reserve some pasta water.

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.

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.

Pesto, on the other hand, flourishes best when paired with thinner noodles, such as spaghetti and linguine, and with shapes that have plenty of twists, grooves, curls, and troughs. Fusilli is not only one of the most well-known pasta shapes; it's also the UK's most popular and our ultimate shape to use with pesto.

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.

PESTO SHOULD NEVER BE “COOKED”. If you cook Pesto Sauce, you change the make up of the fresh basil and cause it to turn darker in color. It is best to warm it up and use it at room temperature. If it needs to be thinned out, you can do so by adding a little water, chicken stock, cream or white wine.

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.

Most pesto recipes call for Parmesan cheese; we often use Romano which has a stronger flavor. Basil pesto recipes often call for pine nuts, but you can easily substitute walnuts.

Is spaghetti and pesto healthy? ›

The Bottom Line. Pesto is higher in calories than some sauces but it's also made with super-healthy ingredients, like basil, olive oil and nuts. I find it's a great way to add more flavor to pasta dishes and even vegetables and proteins.

It's up to you if you want to use Pecorino Romano or classic Parmesan, but there is one rule you must follow: Pestos need hard, salty, aged cheeses. Creamy fresh fromage, like chèvre, doesn't combine well, and makes for a gloopy sauce.

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 secret to making it even stickier is to mix it with a little bit of the water you cooked your pasta in. This water is bursting with starch and acts as an emulsifier and a thickener, giving you the best possible chance of serving a restaurant-quality dish.

Add all other ingredients into the mixing bowl with the pasta. Toss until all of the ingredients are evenly coated with the pesto. Serve immediately, garnished with fresh chopped parsley or basil and black pepper, if desired. This pasta is great served warm, room temperature or chilled.

The other key to making this extra delicious is the combination of cheeses. First, you want to toss the pesto-coated pasta with some grated cheese. I like to use freshly grated provolone but if I'm in a pinch, I'll use the Tillamook italian blend cheese mix, which is fabulous.

Deliciously flavorful basil pesto, ricotta cheese & cream cheese are combined to make a creamy, cheesy sauce. The sauce is tossed with pasta shells in this easy 20 minute pesto pasta recipe! To say that I'm a big fan of pesto would be the understatement of the century!