Salmon Pesto Pasta with Broccoli
This salmon pesto pasta recipe is a happy weeknight meal, or a classic dish to serve your weekend dinner guests.
We know, you can buy pre-made pesto in the store. But fresh pesto is super simple and worth the few extra steps for freshness and quality. Crisp green basil leaves, a few garlic cloves, pine nuts, olive oil and Parmesan cheese are ingredients you can find in any supermarket, but the taste is out of this world.
Some people are afraid to cook fish, but if they knew how easy it was, they’d do it all the time! Just add olive oil to the sauté pan and let the pan get hot. You’ll know when the oil is ready if you add a droplet of water to the pan and the oil ripples. Add room temperature salmon filets to a sauté pan. Let the salmon sauté for about five minutes and flip for another few minutes. The rule of thumb is 10 minutes per inch of thickness.
Salmon Pesto Pasta with Broccoli Recipe
Ingredients
pesto
- 3 cups fresh basil leaves
- 3 cloves garlic
- 3/4 cup Parmesan cheese
- 1/2 cup olive oil
- 1/4 cup pine nuts
- 1/2 tsp salt
pasta and salmon
- 1 box farfalle pasta
- 1 bunch broccoli, broken into florets
- 1 tsp olive oil
- 8 oz salmon
- 2 cloves garlic, crushed but left whole
- 1 lime zest of lime
- 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, shredded
Instructions
- To make the pesto, combine basil, garlic, Parmesan cheese, olive oil and pine nuts in food processor. Season with salt then mix until smooth then set aside.
- Bring salted water to boil in large pot and cook pasta 2 minutes less than package directions. Drain in colander, set aside.
- Two minutes before you drain pasta, add broccoli. Boil for about a minute, drain mixture and remove from heat. Add pasta and broccoli back to pot, mix in pesto until combined. Zest lime over pasta and stir in Parmesan cheese, set aside.
- Sauté garlic with olive oil in large pan over medium high heat, about 2-3 minutes then remove garlic. Add salmon and cook 4-5 minutes on first side, flip and cook another 3-4 minutes until opaque and flaky. While salmon is cooking, chop cooked garlic and add to pasta. Remove salmon from the pan when finished. Add pasta mixture to same saute pan, warm for 1-2 minutes. Place in large serving bowl, top with salmon.
- Sprinkle with parmesan cheese and enjoy!
Notes
