Pesto Sauce

Chell

Does anyone know of a ready made pesto sauce which is suitable for vegatarians.

I want to make the pasta with Philli cheese which is advertised on TV. When I have looked at Pesto in the supermarket they have never been veggie.

ChocClare

I don't know about ready-made sauces but pesto is dead easy to make yourself - get yourself a small cup and use it as a measure:

2 cups of basil leaves;3 cloves of garlic;3 tblsps of pine-nuts; 1/2 cup of olive oil.
Put all this in a blender with some pepper and salt and - Now this is presumably what makes your pesto non-vegetarian - add half a cup of grated parmesan cheese.

However, you can replace the parmesan with any hard cheese - I expect you can get tasty vegetarian cheeses, can't you?

Give the whole lot a zhuzh in the blender: there's your pesto sauce.

Incidentally, you can make different pestos: replace the pine-nuts with walnuts and the basil with coriander for example. All yummy!

aimme13

i am strict veggie and love pesto........any health shop will sell veggie pesto and vegan pesto.........think the make is zest, tastes great and cant remember if it was tesco or sainsburys (think tescos) but they do a fresh pesto sauce and it is suitable for veggies (not that cheap) but i had to buy it as i was so happy to find it.........may try at making it myself though

r.mac_2

just wondering how pesto could not be vegetarian???? Do they add meat based gelatines or something

To my mind it is just basil, pine nuts, olive oil and a little garlic with parmezan.

good thought though.............might have that for tea tomorrow

filigree_2

r.mac wrote:

just wondering how pesto could not be vegetarian???? Do they add meat based gelatines or something

To my mind it is just basil, pine nuts, olive oil and a little garlic with parmezan.

good thought though.............might have that for tea tomorrow

Authentic parmesan is made with animal rennet and strict vegetarians can't eat it.

My local health food shop sells veggie pesto, that's the first place I'd try.

Yikes

A quick thought on veggie pesto (or anything else for that matter):

If you happen to notice that a product has been certified kosher, you're going to be in luck. If it says it's kosher dairy, it will have dairy ingredients, and no animal ingredients. If it says it's kosher parve, it will have neither dairy nor meat ingredients in it. The only thing to be wary of is whether or not a product contains fish ingredients, as fish is considered parve (don't ask me why...).

Be prepared to pay a bit more for a certified kosher product than a similar non-certified one.

HTH!

Chell

Thanks for the help. OUr health food shop doesn't stock Pesto. However, I was in Morrisons this afternoon and they are now selling their own brand Pesto sauce which is clearly marked as being veggie. Its very salty, 2.5g per 100g so I may make me own in future.