I use it as the base when making pizza when I have any left in the jar! I have also used it on sandwiches. I am not crazy about basil pesto, so use almost any other kind.

Put it on chicken for grilling.

Pesto and cream cheese on a bagel is pretty yummy.

I concur with Pillog, it can be used just about everywhere, especially where you might use tomato. If anything, it can get a bit overwhelming. I was in Genoa a few weeks ago, and it is of course common across more dishes than just pasta. A common street food, called piesta, is a small rectangle of focaccia with a spoon of fresh pesto in each square.

I also make a variant of Samrin Nosrat's big lasagne recipe but substitute the basil leaves with several large spoonfulls of pesto (and use extra spinach), to amp up the flavor.

We enjoy it on sandwiches, especially chicken. I also make a cream sauce for pan fried chicken or pork by adding a large dollop to the pan, mixing it with the fond and then pouring in heavy cream and letting it thicken a little before serving. DH is not fond of pasta salad but will scarf it down if I use pesto for the dressing and add a lot of chopped sundried tomatoes, olives and jarred artichokes.

Thanks for the ideas everyone!

Carol, not long ago we were served a dish with pesto and salmon that was good. It seemed simple enough, and I found this recipe online that looks similar (ours was also served with the tomatoes). Great suggestions here!

Salmon With Pesto

That reminded me of my aunt baking salmon fillets with pesto long ago, and it was delicious. I might try that soon 🙂

The warming weather has me thinking of making pesto, but we won’t have garden basil for months. What types of pesto do you make that use the least basil, or no basil?

John, I remembered seeing something for pesto w/o basil. It was this…

Basil-less Pesto

If cilantro or parsley appeal, maybe these.

Wild garlic pesto. Allium ursinum (grows wild here and is a weed in my garden), any nuts, any cheese, olive oil. Whizz it up. There are recipes but I don't use one. It's a spring ephemeral so I put some into the freezer.

I threw some leftovers of another pasta sauce into this one, hence the red pepper.

I've used part parsley &/or marjoram to make pesto when I didn't have enough basil. I've seen recipes using spinach too, but I've never tried that.

Ooooohhh....@floral_uk z....that looks really good!

Another alternative is sorrel, as the lemony notes can really go well with many other ingredients. You can also try arugula, and keep the bitterness tamed.. You can use flat leaf parsley, or just do a persillade with some parm. Spinach is sometimes used to fill out and cut commercial pestos.

Never mind. It turned cold and rainy, HVAC switched back to "heat", warming soups back on the menu.

Just kidding, I will try these!

Pesto is made out of lots of differnt combis, I like walnut and sage as a more wintery one.

I saw a recipe with a sheet of puff pastry, spread with pesto, covered with slices of parla ham, then another sheet of pastry then cut into a starburst shape and baked, served with apéritif.

Every time I see the title of this thread the thought crosses my mind: “Besides smear it all over my husband and…?”

Ha! 😄