The roast tomato pesto so good, it’ll be at my funeral (vegan, paleo + Whole30 options!)
Yup. This roast tomato pesto will make an appearance at my funeral. It’s THAT good.
It won’t be there as the main course, though. (I’ll let the hot celebrity chef who I assume will be catering handle the menu.) This dish will be there as an offering, of sorts.
Joe and I were talking about our funerals the other day. Ya know, as normal Millennial couples do…
And I thought that I’d like to share something — a song, a lesson, a story — to sum up what was most important to me in life. The idea to share a recipe popped into my head.
It’s perfect! Food and cooking are my great joys in life. As someone who has a hard time living in the present, good food always has a way of pulling me back down into my body, into that bite, into those particular flavors.
The sights, the smells, the creativity of it all…cooking just DOES IT for me.
Not to mention the simple pleasure of loving on friends and family through food — the best!
So I thought it’d be cool to share a recipe card with everyone at my funeral, a dish they could make and share with their families and think of me when they make it.
My mom’s friend (who’s since passed away) gave us her famous vodka sauce recipe when we were kids. And still, whenever I make vodka sauce, I think of her.
That’s magic to me. ✨
“But how can I possibly choose just ONE recipe to share at my funeral?” I thought. And then I remembered this roast tomato pesto and was like, “Oh yeah. One’s enough.”
It’s freaking delicious. It’s seasonal. It’s easy. And it’s SUPER versatile. The sauce is vegan, gluten-free, and paleo (even Whole30!) and you can serve it over pasta, zucchini noodles, chicken, toast…whatever tickles your pickle.
And it would really be selfish to make you wait until my funeral for this deliciousness, right? It’s perfect for late-summertime when the tomatoes and basil are overflowing the farmer market carts.
I make this roast tomato pesto right in a quart mason jar using a stick blender because it saves on cleanup. But you can use a food processor or regular blender, too. It’s actually impossible to mess this up.
The original recipe came from ohsheglows.com but I’ve made it so many times over the years, I honestly don’t follow a recipe anymore. I just use some tomatoes, however much basil looks right, and eyeball or taste to figure out how much of the other ingredients. Seriously. Unmessupable. 🙌🏻
The tomatoes take a while to roast but it’s passive cooking time — you can fit in three Grace & Frankie episodes if you play it right. 😉
The world’s best roast tomato pesto recipe
INGREDIENTS
1.5 cups of tomatoes (whatever kind you have is fine), sliced in half lengthwise
1/2 cup almonds
2 garlic cloves, roughly chopped (if you’re like me, you’ll want to add an extra 15 to that…but this garlic is going in raw so do 3 cloves, max)
1 cup basil, tightly packed
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil (+ more for roasting your tomatoes)
2 Tbsp nutritional yeast (I suppose you could use parmesan cheese instead but I’ve always used nutritional yeast)
Salt and black pepper, to taste
Whatever you’d like to serve it with: pasta, chicken, crostini…the world is your oyster!
INSTRUCTIONS
1. Preheat your oven to 400F/205C. Put your sliced tomatoes on a baking sheet and drizzle with olive oil, add salt and pepper, then toss. Flip ‘em all so they’re cut-side up on the pan. If you’re using different sized tomatoes (like I am below) group similar sizes together on the tray.
2. Roast your tomatoes for about an hour. You want your tomatoes to blacken on the bottom and along the top edge. All ovens are different and yours may need more or less time, so keep an eye on them!
(I scooped out the little ones on the left at this point and put the bigger ones back in the oven for another 10ish minutes; they weren’t dark and roast-y enough yet.)
While the tomatoes are roasting, prep the rest of your sauce.
3. Combine basil, olive oil, and chopped garlic in a quart-size mason jar and use a stick blender to get a, ya know, pesto-like consistency.
4. When the tomatoes are done roasting, pour them right into your mason jar., along with any oil and juices on the baking sheet. There’s insaaaaane flavor in that oil so don’t waste it! The tomatoes will have shrunk way down by this point so they’ll fit neatly in your jar.
See? Super shrunk. 👇
5. Turn your oven down to 325F/160C and roast your almonds. Pour the almonds onto your tomato baking tray (no use dirtying another pan!) and toast them for about 10 minutes, until they’re nicely toasted.
Again, depending on your oven, you may need a bit longer or shorter. You want their color to be a bit darker and them to smell nutty and fragrant. If you’re unsure, it’s better to under-roast than over-roast here; burnt nuts taste terrible. Heyo! (But really.)
When they’re done, roughly chop your almonds into smallish pieces then pour them into the mason jar with the rest of the sauce.
6. Top off your mason jar with the nutritional yeast and blend it all up. Add s’more olive oil if it’s too thick. I like to keep mine chunky but go with whatever texture feels good to you. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
7. Serve however you like!
We normally have ours with regular pasta but you can use rice noodles, zucchini, or other paleo pasta if you’d rather. I bet this roast tomato pesto would be awesome over roast chicken or crostini, too. 😋
You can top with grated parm, sliced chicken, grilled shrimp, crispy roast chickpeas, roast veggies…do what you feel!
All that’s left to do is enjoy!
When you make this roast tomato pesto, just promise me you’ll think of your pal Whit, okay? And make sure you use this meal as a way to slow down, get present, savor the flavor. ✌️
