If you're looking for a spinach pesto recipe without nuts, today is your lucky day. This low carb pesto sauce is the perfect way to dress your favorite veggie noodles for a healthy alternative to a pasta dish; personally, I love to whip up a fresh pesto during dinnertime to pair with my protein. Spinach pesto is a delicious topping or stuffing for meat!
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Keto Sauces
You know by now that all of the recipes I develop are geared towards a low carb ketogenic diet. When it comes to keto sauces, store-bought dressings are hit or miss. They're either loaded with carbs or strange ingredients that seem completely unnecessary. For that reason, I prefer making homemade sauces and condiments. Then I know exactly what I'm eating, and everything tastes way better!
Pesto tends to be one of those things that's generally keto friendly if you pick it up from the store though. With basil, oil, cheese, and pine nuts as the primary ingredients, it's usually a safe bet for the keto diet. Finding a spinach pesto without nuts at the store is an entirely different story; I have yet to see one! Homemade pesto seems to be the only way to go in this situation.
Spinach Pesto Recipe without Nuts Recipe
For the spinach pesto recipe, we'll be using basil, spinach, Parmesan cheese, olive oil, garlic, sea salt, and black pepper.
If you want to use raw spinach, that's great, but you'll need to cook it down a little to wilt first before combining the remaining ingredients. I cheated and thawed frozen spinach here.
Parmesan cheese can be substituted with Romano cheese instead if you have that on hand or prefer the flavor.
And finally, the amount of olive oil can be tailored to your preference as well. I enjoy a very thick pesto, and this recipe reflects that. As I said before, I enjoy using it as a stuffing - like in my keto chicken roulade recipe. The thicker pesto holds up well in that type of dish. If you want a thinner, more liquidy pesto, just increase the amount of olive oil used.
Combine everything in a food processor or blender and enjoy!
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups basil leaves fresh
- ⅓ cup spinach frozen & thawed
- ¼ cup Parmesan cheese fresh, finely grated
- 1 clove garlic minced
- 1 tsp sea salt
- 1 tsp black pepper ground
- ¼ cup olive oil
Instructions
- Pulse basil, spinach, Parmesan, garlic, salt, and pepper in a food processor or blender, and slowly drizzle in olive oil.
- Pulse and scrape down the sides as needed to ensure all ingredients are thoroughly incorporated. Continuing incorporating olive oil until you reach the desired consistency.
Nutrition
Hi, I'm Tasha–nutritionist, recipe developer, and multi-published author dedicated to helping people thrive and succeed using low carb and keto dietary patterns.
This recipe is AMAZING ! I love spinach but I wasn't sure how to cook them in a keto recipe, now I know and I will reuse this recipe over and over again ! 😀
Spinach is awesome for keto! Slow glad you enjoyed the pesto recipe and thank you for taking the time to leave a comment.