Salads with pesto sauce occupy a separate niche in the culinary art. These are healthy, tasty and hearty dishes that can be prepared not only for the festive table, but also on a typical day - for breakfast, lunch or dinner. Most of them are ideal for a light snack, and some can even replace a full meal.
Cooking Basics - Pesto Sauce
Before choosing a salad, you need to prepare a dressing. Pesto sauce consists of the following ingredients:
- 50 g of fresh leaves of basil and parmesan cheese;
- pine nuts - 2 tablespoons;
- garlic - 2 cloves;
- salt to taste;
- olive oil - 50 ml.
Salads with pesto sauce will have a brighter taste if the list of these products is not modified. This is a traditional dressing recipe that appeared in Genoa, Italy. Adding other ingredients can disrupt the harmony and balance that is inherent in an original recipe.
So, first you need to rinse and dry the basil leaves, then cut the cheese into small pieces, peel and cut the garlic in half. Put it all in a blender, add nuts, a little salt and oil, and then chop. You do not need to keep the blender on for a long time, wanting to get the most chopped products. On the contrary, the sauce should be patchy.
Caprese Salad with Pesto Sauce
Caprese is a delicious and easy-to-prepare Italian salad, perhaps known all over the world. It is also called the “ideal trio”, because the dish combines tomatoes, mozzarella and basil, and together these products form an unrivaled taste. To prepare Caprese according to the classic recipe, you need to prepare:
- 6 tomatoes;
- 250 g mozzarella;
- 20 g of basil;
- 3 tablespoons of pesto sauce.
The peculiarity of this salad with pesto sauce, mozzarella and tomatoes is that the last 2 ingredients must be cut into slices, the thickness of which will be approximately 7 mm. To make it work, you need to take solid tomatoes. Soft varieties just spread on a plate when sliced. Mozzarella cheese, which is sold as "balls", is first cut across, and then in half, in even parts. Basil leaves need to be washed and dried.
Serving requires a flat dish. Slices of tomatoes and cheese are laid on it, alternating between them. At the same time, the next product overlaps with the previous one (this can be clearly seen in the salad photo). Top the salad with a pesto sauce and decorate the center with basil leaves.
Warm Potato Salad with Pesto
This Mediterranean-style appetizer turns out to be very tasty and satisfying. Warm potato salad with pesto can serve as an independent dish or side dish. It is prepared from such products:
- 6 quail eggs;
- 400 g of potatoes;
- 3 tablespoons of green canned peas;
- spices to taste.
Boil the potatoes in their skins, peel and cut into 2 parts. This must be done until it cools down so that the salad is warm. Put potato halves in a bowl, add peas, then a couple of tablespoons of pesto sauce, if desired, spices and mix well. When the salad is on the serving plates, put boiled quail eggs, cut in half, on top and decorate the dish with a sprig of basil.
Salad with tuna and Adyghe cheese in sauce
This dish also turns out to be unusual and incredibly tasty. This salad recipe with pesto, like Caprese, is good because it is quick and fairly easy to prepare. The following products are required for this:
- 1 tablespoon pesto sauce;
- 150 g Adyghe cheese;
- 250 g of cherry;
- 1 can of canned tuna in its own juice;
- spices and garlic to taste.
From a can of tuna you need to drain the liquid, put the fish in a bowl, then add seasonings, garlic and sauce, mix everything well. Adyghe cheese cut into cubes, put in a salad bowl. Mix gently. Cut the tomatoes in half, transfer to a bowl. Mix the salad as carefully as possible so as not to crush the cherry.
Salads with pesto are not the only option for dishes prepared with such an interesting dressing. We suggest watching a video recipe that tells how to cook chicken with pesto, cherry and mozzarella. The result will be a very delicious full-fledged dish, which is perfect for both dinner with the family and for meeting guests.