Making basil pesto

Since my basil plants were on the verge of bolting I decided it was time to make basil pesto.   I had just pinned a recipe from Pinterest and was inspired to try it out.   The recipe I used was from the Heather Bullard website, click on the link to see her recipe.

I made the pesto according to her directions and it turned out great. I then made a couple other batches with a few changes as I was running out of ingredients. 


Here are a few of the changes I tried, successfully and non-successfully.

I substituted walnuts for pine nuts and even though it changes the flavor a bit the walnut pesto is still delicious.
I ran out of olive oil and tried substituting grapeseed oil. This definitely changed the taste of the pesto and left it a little bland. The olive oil does add flavor to the pesto.
I found it is important to use a real grated hard cheese, such as Parmesan. My last batch I was running out of "real" Parmesan and substituted a store brand "grated Parmesan" that is a softer cheese.  The texture of the pesto changed and got a little gooey.

'til next time...