Pesto Alla Trapanese (Sicilian Pesto)
Pesto alla Trapanese is a delicious Sicilian pesto made with 3 main ingredients: almonds, tomatoes and basil. It's a perfect summer pasta sauce to serve warm or cold.
Servings: 6
Calories: 135kcal
Ingredients
- 14 oz cherry tomatoes (400 grams or 30 cherry tomatoes)
- 1 sprig fresh basil (10 grams) - 6-inch sprig
- 4 tablespoon blanched almonds (50 grams)
- 4 tablespoon Extra virgin olive oil or a little more if needed
- 2 garlic clove , more or less to taste
- pinch Salt
Instructions
Make Pesto Alla Trapanese
- Place blanched almonds and peeled garlic in a food processor. Pulse until you get crumbly consistency.
- Cut cherry tomatoes into small cubes. Add a pinch of salt, mix, and place in a strainer to eliminate excess liquid. Let sit for 5 minutes then press with a spatula.
- Add strained tomatoes and hand torn basil leaves to the almond crumble. Pulse a few times making frequent stops until creamy but still rustic consistency.
Season Pasta
- Boil pasta in well salted water until 'al dente'. Drain and add to a bowl. Top with Pesto Trapanese, mix adding a little more extra virgin olive oil if needed.
- It's delicious served warm or cold.
Notes
See the Step By Step Pictures for a visual walk-through of the recipe.
Top Tips
- Cut tomatoes in small cubes. This is a crucial step that does two things:
- helps eliminate excess water from the tomatoes
- helps get the perfectly consistency in a blender with a just a few pulses.
- Strain excess water from the tomatoes. You don't want your pesto to be watery!
- Don't over-pulse. Over-pulsing this Sicilian pesto will result in a mush lacking flavor and texture. For this reason we pulsed almonds and garlic first (since the require more time to be ground) and then added tomatoes cut in small cubes so that tomatoes would be blended in as MINIMUM pulses as possible.
- Don't cook it in the pan. Season pasta in a large bowl away from the heat. This is the beauty of this pesto that it's best flavors come out raw.
- Choose the right tomato variety. Since all ingredients in Pesto Trapanese are raw, you' literally get what you put in it. Bland testing tomatoes will result in a bland tasting pesto. I highly recommend cherry or grape tomatoes for their sweetness and thin skin. See ingredients and substitutes section for more details.
Nutrition
Calories: 135kcal | Carbohydrates: 4g | Protein: 2g | Fat: 13g | Saturated Fat: 2g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 2g | Monounsaturated Fat: 9g | Trans Fat: 0.002g | Sodium: 9mg | Potassium: 193mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 2g | Vitamin A: 342IU | Vitamin C: 15mg | Calcium: 26mg | Iron: 1mg