Easy Pesto Sauce Recipes

Pounding the ingredients in a mortar produces a pesto of incomparable texture: silky basil leaves and olive oil bind coarser bits of garlic and Parmesan.

Toss this pesto with pasta or roasted vegetables, spread it on thickly sliced tomatoes and broil, or stuff it under the skin of a chicken before roasting.

This isn't a typical pesto, since it has no cheese; instead, it's made with an irresistible blend of crunchy toasted hazelnuts, fresh green parsley, salty green olives and garlic.

Rick Bayless of Chicago's Frontera Grill keeps extra cilantro from going to waste by using it in this pesto, which can stay in the fridge for two months. Try it on fish or add a little to soup.

This delicious, easy pesto, made with roasted pistachios and fresh oregano, is perfect with roasted, grilled or steamed fish.

Mint and lamb are a classic pairing. Grace Parisi riffs on the match by kneading mint pesto into ground lamb, grilling the patties, then crumbling them into an orzo-and-feta salad.

Using asparagus in a pesto with olive oil, Parmigiano-Reggiano, basil and lemon juice creates a very fresh, green and spring-like sauce for pasta.

Grace Parisi likes using a mix of brine- and oil-cured olives for a more complex pesto; her favorites are green Sicilian, Calamata, Cerignola and oil-cured Moroccan.

Instead of making a pesto with basil alone, Grace Parisi blends it with two of summer's most prolific tender herbs--parsley and mint--to make it more complex. Mix the pesto with ground beef to make meat balls or meat loaf, or whisk it with vinegar to create a delicious herb dressing for salad, tomatoes or fish.