Original Pesto alla Trapanese

Welcome back to my little corner of the internet!

Today we are back at making pesto. There is this delicious pesto from Sicily, actually from the town of Trapani, hence the name “trapanese” (from Trapani).

As all pesto recipes, this one also requires a mortar and uses very simple and fresh ingredients. Once again, nuts, basil and garlic are at the heart of the recipe.

This is a really easy and quick recipe, that you can make in a flash and it is really fresh and ideal for the summer.

Ingredients:

1 clove of garlic

50 g almonds

250 g tomatoes

1 small bunch fresh basil

Pecorino

Salt

Pepper

For this recipe you’ll need a mortar or a blender. If you are using a blender, just throw all the ingredients in together and blend them.

Firstly, if you are using almonds with peel, you’ll need to remove the peel first. For this, bring a pot with water to the boil and boil your almonds for a couple of minutes. Drain and now you can just pop them out of their peels.

In a mortar, work the garlic into a paste. Add the basil and almonds and pound them until smooth.

Now, on to the tomatoes. Technically, for the recipe you should peel the tomatoes and remove the seeds, but I prefer to use them whole. I chop them up and pour them into a bowl.

Then I add the pounded basil and almonds to the tomatoes, mix the whole and add the grated pecorino cheese. Season with salt and pepper and if your tomatoes are very dry, add a little olive oil.

Serve on bruschette or with short pasta.

Do you like different types of pesto? Which one is your favourite? Let me know in the comments below.

Love,

Raffi