Pasta with broccoli and walnut pesto with pancetta, a tasty and hearty first course, perfect even for getting kids to eat broccoli. Broccoli pesto pasta is a delicious and playful recipe to enjoy broccoli in a simple but original way. A dish where the intense flavor of broccoli is softened by Parmesan and walnuts, which give us a light and very tasty broccoli pesto that envelops the pasta in a delicious cream. My children don’t like broccoli, but when I prepare broccoli pesto pasta, as if by magic they devour huge plates, precisely because this creamy and delicious first course always wins them over, especially if enriched with a bit of crispy pancetta. Would you like to prepare broccoli and walnut pesto to make an original, flavorful winter first course? Let’s head to the kitchen — our recipe awaits — but before rushing to the stove, I remind you that if you want to stay updated on my recipes, you can follow my Facebook page and my Instagram profile, and that if you want to make a vegetarian version of the pasta with broccoli pesto, you just need to omit the pancetta.
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- Difficulty: Very easy
- Cost: Very affordable
- Preparation time: 20 Minutes
- Portions: 5
- Cooking methods: Stovetop
- Cuisine: Italian
Ingredients to make pasta with broccoli and walnut pesto
- 3 cups broccoli florets
- 4 1/2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 2 tbsp sun-dried tomatoes
- to taste salt
- to taste black pepper
- 1/3 cup grated Parmesan (or Grana Padano)
- 1/2 cup walnut halves
- as needed water (pasta cooking water)
- 1 lb pasta
Tools
- Pots
- Blender
Steps to make pasta with broccoli and walnut pesto
Bring a pot full of unsalted water to a boil. Separate the broccoli florets from one another and remove the toughest part of the stem, rinse them, drain them and plunge them into the boiling water. Blanch everything for about 7–8 minutes; the broccoli should be al dente, still a vivid green and not mushy. Collect them in a bowl without throwing away the cooking water and let them cool — I recommend placing them on a windowsill so they cool quickly or immersing them in ice water (to keep a vivid green).
After removing the broccoli, season the water with salt and cook the pasta in the same water. In a separate pan sauté the pancetta in its own fat.
Place the broccoli in the blender jar along with the cheese (in pieces or grated), the pepper, the walnuts, the sun-dried tomatoes and the oil; you can add more oil than indicated or add some of the pasta cooking water for a lighter pesto. Blend until you obtain a cream and adjust the salt (just a pinch because the cheese and sun-dried tomatoes already add salt).
Drain the pasta and toss it with the pesto and the pancetta; adjust the creaminess by stirring in a little of the cooking water, plate immediately — you’ll see you’ll get a super creamy first course without adding cream.
Prepare the amount of pasta you plan to eat; any leftover pesto for smaller quantities of pasta can be frozen and thawed as needed, directly in the fridge or for a few minutes at room temperature.
