Homemade Roasted Tomato Pesto

I am NOT saying regular ol’ basil pesto is old news… but I AM saying that this roasted bell pepper and sun dried tomato pesto is a-freaking-mazing!! This came from just wanting to have some, lets call it “regular” pesto in the house. Which I do love eating. Side note: I regularly make a charcuterie plate that is fancier than one should make when eating a too late of lunch whilst shamelessly eating alone while monster toddler sleeps. Possibly with a smallish glass of champagne. (yes, it took me nearly 40 years to decide that is my beverage of choice) Please excuse the run on sentence. You will get random glances of how my brain works through my off subject ramblings. Which, that wasn’t completely off subject, said charcuterie plate consists of pesto and goat cheese. A glance of my standard lunch.

 

 

 

Alright, back at it!! Roasted bell pepper and sun dried tomato pesto!! Super easy!! Super delish!

I’ve only made pesto in a food processor, pretty sure you can use a blender. There isn’t much prep to pesto. And it goes pretty quick. Few things to do first though, we are toasting walnuts and pine nuts for this pesto. So pre-heat your oven to 350. Bake walnuts first for 5 min, the add the pine nuts and cook them both for another 10 min. You cook the walnuts first otherwise your pine nuts will burn.

 

While nuts are baking, drain the juice out of your roasted peppers and sun dried tomatoes.  Keep the juice, put back into jar if you have left over. You add to the pesto or can use in other dishes if you’re on top of your game for meal planning. Which I am not, yet! Work in progress.

Start loading your food processor. Dump in peppers and tomatoes. Next thing is to mince your garlic and grate your parmesan, if you’re using fresh. Otherwise, buy already minced and finely grated to save time. Ain’t no shame in that game guys!!

It doesn’t matter what order this goes. Just put it in as it’s ready. We are also adding arugula, basil, walnuts and pine nuts when they are good and toasty and crushed red pepper. This is what my food processor looks like before I add the lid.

Now we are going to put the lid on and pulse a few times to break it all down.

Now you’re going to start by adding some of the juice we reserved from the peppers and tomatoes. Dump that in and blend. I added another handful of cheese.

You’ll turn it back on and slowly drizzle your olive oil into it as its blending, til its ready. You will know the pesto is ready when its mixing and you see it start to pull away from the sides. If it doesn’t pull aways, keep adding oil. It will, give it a little time. Although, this doesn’t take long.

Viola! Pesto!! So many ways to eat it!! Again, charcuterie, pasta, we made homemade pizza and used pesto instead of marinara. SO good!

Pesto ingredients coming soon!

~Jeanne