Gluten free Pesto alla Siciliana

My beloved brother Francesco made me taste gluten free pasta with pesto alla siciliana sauce once. I got in love with it. So fresh and so good. I cannot help doing it for tonight’s dinner with a couple of friends. By the way pesto sauce is also raw – so most of the properties of the food don’t get lost in the cooking.

This recipe is very simple and it takes 15 to 20 minutes to do it.

Let’s chop the almonds first so that it will be easier to mix them (if you have a powerful food processor, you don’t need to do that).

Wash the cherry tomatoes gently.

Grate the pecorino romano cheese.

Peel the clove of fresh garlic.

Put the almonds + the cherry tomatoes + 1 clove of garlic + the pecorino romano + the extra virgin olive oil in the food processor and start mixing the ingredients.

When you make a sauce like pesto, the consistency is key.

Mine is silky and creamy so that it will stick beautifully to the pasta.

If for some reasons it gets too liquid for example – it might be the size of the cherry tomatoes that is different from mine – adjust the sauce by adding some more cheese.

The pecorino romano that I bought was salty enough to me so I didn’t feel like adding any salt to the sauce but if you feel you do, don’t hesitate to add a pinch.

For the gluten free pasta, this time I went for the “tortiglioni” – they are one kind of funny looking pasta and so good. Mine were from an Italian brand that I like very much: La Fabbrica della Pasta. They are from the region of Campania where I was born. Campania is well-known all over the world for its artisanal, tasty pasta. I can say that their new gluten free range is just fantastic.

To cook the pasta, put one large pot with a lot of water over medium heat.

When the water is about to boil, add the pasta and then a pinch of salt.

As a personal advice, don’t trust the minutes written on the package, it is very rare that they correspond to how you like the pasta (al dente or not). I suggest to do it as I do, start tasting it after the first 3/4 minutes… it helps 😉 Also, when you cook the pasta, the water doesn’t have to boil just simmer. To get the right consistency, all kind of pasta has to be cooked slowly.

Once the pasta is ready, drain all the water and put it in a large bowl.

Add the pesto sauce.

Serve the pasta with some leaves of fresh basil on top.

Buon Appetito!