Creamy Pesto Gnocchi with Bacon & Parmesan | Easy Dinner Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What to serve with pesto gnocchi? ›

Pesto gnocchi can be served as a delicious lunch or easy dinner main. We often like to pair it with our garlic bread, but it can also be paired with a simple salad or additional roasted vegetables like green beans, Brussels sprouts, or asparagus spears.

Irresistible, marinated steak bites are served with perfectly browned gnocchi in this quick and easy, family favorite meal. Steak bites and gnocchi combine the richness of tender beef with the convenience of gnocchi. This dish is a perfect blend of flavors and textures, making it a delightful meal for any occasion.

When it comes to pairing wine with pesto, we favour dry, crisp, and acidic white wines such as Pinot Grigio, Vermentino, or Sauvignon Blanc. If you prefer red wine, then we'd recommend something light-bodied like Beaujolais, Dolcetto, or Pinot Noir.

Roasted potatoes and polenta are perfect to serve alongside this dish. The trick for making this is to prepare it the day before, then let the meat rest overnight so that the oil softens its fibers even more.

Add protein: Serve this pesto gnocchi recipe with grilled or roasted chicken, salmon, shrimp, steak, or sausage. This is perfect with a rotisserie chicken and a simple salad for an ultra-quick dinner!

Gnocchi are commonly cooked in salted boiling water and then dressed with various sauces. They are usually eaten as a first course (primo) as an alternative to soups (minestre) or pasta, but they can also be served as a contorno (side dish) to some main courses.

The Gnudi, or spinach and ricotta gnocchi, is a typical recipe from Tuscany, usually served with a simple tomato sauce or with butter and sage. In fancy restaurants, sometimes these are served with very special aged parmesan cheese like pecorino or with a slice of lard that melts in contact with the hot gnocchi.

Nutritional Value

Believe it or not, regular pasta is actually more carb-heavy than gnocchi, coming in at around 2 times the amount of carbs per serving. Gnocchi is also notorious for having a lot more sodium, with over 200 grams of it per serving. Regular pasta doesn't have nearly as high of a sodium content.

Italian Tradition

It can be mixed into tomato sauce to enhance the flavor of pasta dishes or used with fish fillets to make them more appetizing. There are other versions of pesto with variations in the ingredients, but these are not part of the Ligurian tradition.

"I'd go for a margarita, because I like the herbaceous taste of tequila with herb-based sauces," says Willoughby. "A basil-lime gimlet gives you the clean tastes of gin and lime along with a direct match for the basil in the pesto. Just don't have more than one, or you won't be tasting too much at all."

What pasta tastes best with pesto? ›

Pesto Sauce

This fresh and fragrant pasta sauce is served uncooked, so choose a pasta shape that won't overwhelm it. Similar to oil-based sauces, pesto is served best with longer cuts of pasta, like the corkscrew shape of Fusilli. Pesto works best with Bucatini, Capellini, thinner Spaghettini, and Fettuccine.

So instead of boiling or baking a package of gnocchi on a Wednesday night and wishing it tasted more like the pillowy homemade version, I broil it. Yep, that's right: I rip open one of those shelf-stable packages, toss the gnocchi with a tablespoon of olive oil, a lot of grated Parmesan cheese and a little bit of salt.

Gnocchi should be soft, melt-in-your-mouth, fluffy pillows. They should not be tough and chewy. Is it better to boil or fry gnocchi? Both boiling and frying are good for gnocchi, but boiling is the most traditional method—and it's quick and easy.

The best side dishes to serve with pesto pasta are mushroom risotto, steamed vegetables, sauteed vegetables, tempeh, beef and broccoli, teriyaki salmon, eggplant parmesan, shrimp scampi, fried shrimp, cheese curds, arugula salad, bread rolls and white beans and bacon.

You can use either homemade pesto or store-bought pesto. Serve alongside garlic bread or a big green salad an easy weeknight dinner. Nothing says summer like tendrils of pasta, fresh mozzarella pearls, juicy tomatoes, and crunchy cucumber dressed in a basil pesto sauce.

It originated in the Italian city of Genoa, and is used to dress pasta and sometimes soups.