Hi! Heather the babysitter here bringing you another  babysitter friendly snack! I absolutely love pesto. In fact, last summer I became so obsessed with making it that I stripped my poor basil plant of all of it’s leaves leaving it to wilt, bare in the summer sun. The great thing about pesto though, is you don’t need a long list of ingredients. It consists mostly of items that we tend to have around the house, garlic cloves, Parmesan cheese, basil, lemon, olive oil and (traditionally) pine nuts. I love to substitute Marcona almonds or walnuts for an even nuttier flavor.

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As a babysitter, I’ve often noticed kids eating pasta stirred together with a store-bought version of this nutty basil puree. But the truth is that pesto is really easy to make at home. And to make things even quicker and healthier for the  babysitter, we’ve made a healthy pesto dip. This way the kiddos can enjoy the flavors of pesto with veggies and your babysitter doesn’t even have to boil water.

First we made the pesto in the food processor. It’s fun to watch it blend into a beautiful green hue and then let the kids fold in the Parmesan at the end.

In this recipe you will have some extra pesto left over to save for serving over pasta, on a sandwich or however you desire.