When you’ve got a fridge overflowing with courgettes and less than 30 minutes to cook, courgette pesto pasta comes to the rescue. The Italian summer dish is green, mean (on the flavour), bright, punchy, a touch spicy, and surprisingly creamy.

Don’t be mistaken: This isn’t the typical courgette pesto pasta recipe.

I’ve opted for a different route. Rather than oven-roasting the courgette slices, I choose to cook the summer vegetable directly in a pan with a splash of balsamic and a sprinkling of chilli flakes. They turn soft, sweet, and almost jammy, with just a touch of char.

Once the courgettes melt into the pesto, the sauce becomes uncharacteristically rich, creamy, and beautifully thick, perfectly coating every piece of our pasta.

Compared to the more orthodox spaghetti al pesto, this dish is more comforting, with unexpected, exciting flavours working in the background: a smoky warmth from chilli flakes and complex tart sweetness from balsamic that beautifully matches with the nutty, savoury, and highly aromatic flavours of pesto.

It’s the best way to work more healthy vegetables into your meal — it doesn’t feel like a chore or a trick, just good old-fashioned cookery with a great twist. With recipes like this, hitting your 5-a-day goal doesn’t seem so hard after all.

💚 Why This Courgette Pesto Pasta Recipe is the Best

Fast, fuss free, and no need to turn on your oven. From start to finish, you’ll need less than 30 minutes to make this courgette pesto pasta, making it fantastic for quick midweek meals. And there’s no need to switch the oven on in summer (sighs of relief!).
The best way to use up summer courgettes. If you grow your own food, you know the glut — blending the courgettes into the pesto is a new way to get the best flavour out of the veg. It rivals my courgette galette on flavour, too!
Bright, fresh, summer flavours. This recipe highlights courgettes, yes, but also the sunny, light taste of homemade pesto and fresh basil.
Naturally vegetarian and adaptable. It’s easy to make this dish vegan, gluten free, and nut free. A few simple swaps are key — I’ve given all the guidance needed for easy allergy-free dining.

Labelled ingredients for courgette pesto pasta on a white background.

🛒 Ingredients You’ll Need

For a recipe that really brings out the big ‘uns when it comes to impactful flavour, courgette pesto pasta only has a short, simple ingredient list:

Courgette (zucchini): Mild, sweet, and creamy, this summer squash is the perfect addition to pesto.
Pasta: I’ve used trofie, a thin twisted pasta from the Liguria region, traditionally served with pesto. If you can’t find trofie, opt for other short pasta like penne, gemelli, or strozzapreti.
Balsamic vinegar: Rich and complex, balsamic balances notes of sweetness and bright tanginess, cutting through the herbaceous pesto. You can substitute lemon juice.
Chilli flakes: Mild Italian crushed chilli flakes add just a touch of heat to excite the palate.
Olive oil: Use a great quality Italian olive oil for the best results. Tip: Olive oil sold in clear plastic (or glass) is often a sign of a lesser standard. Instead, choose olive oil in a tin. We’ll use this grassy, fruity oil to sauté the courgettes and make the pesto.

Now, you can approach this courgette pesto pasta recipe in two ways.

Your first option is to buy pesto (or use homemade pesto you’ve stored) and blend in the courgette. I recommend my fool proof basil pesto recipe; store-bought pesto isn’t often vegetarian, and besides, homemade boasts a flavour that’s a thousand times superior.

Alternatively, make the pesto especially for this recipe! It’s less work than it sounds. You’ll need a few other ingredients, but only around five minutes of extra time (I’m being generous … it’s more like three minutes!)

If you choose the latter, here’s what you’ll need (also pictured above):

Basil: For pesto, Genovese basil is undoubtedly the king of kings. It has a more robust, intense flavour that lends the sauce its distinctively strong flavour. If you can’t find Genovese basil locally, use fresh sweet basil (the kind usually just labelled as “basil”).
Garlic: Just a touch for punchiness.
Pine nuts: Buttery, creamy, and essential for classic pesto Genovese.
Vegetarian hard cheese: I’ve used pecorino. Some traditional pesto uses Parmesan, which isn’t typically vegetarian. Pecorino is also a traditional choice, albeit less common. It’s deeply savoury, nutty, and salty, so a little goes a long way. Vegan? Read more about substitutes below.

Adapting This Recipe for Allergies and Dietary Requirements

Courgette pesto pasta is already 100% vegetarian, and soy free. Adapting the recipe to be vegan, gluten free, and nut free, is easy. Let’s see how.

Make courgette pesto pasta vegan by skipping the hard cheese used in the pesto and topping. You can use a plant-based brand of your choice, or substitute for nutritional yeast for a cheesy flavour. That’s all you need to do!
Make courgette pesto pasta nut free by swapping pine nuts in the pesto for sunflower seeds or pumpkin seeds. It’s a great hack to make the recipe suitable for allergies without sacrificing flavour.
Make courgette pesto pasta gluten free by using a gluten free pasta. These brands are becoming more commonplace in most large stores now, but there’s great variety available online, if you don’t have local accessibility. I recommend Rummo gluten free penne. That’s the only change you need to make.

Variations and Substitutions

Want a fun low-carb version? Skip the pasta completely and toss the courgette pesto through courgetti zoodles, AKA spiralised courgette. It was all the rage a few years ago, and it still tastes fantastic.
Add protein! This recipe might be packing a tonne of plant points, but it’s not a protein-rich meal … yet. Use high protein pasta and stir through oven-baked chickpeas, crispy tofu, or grilled halloumi to hit your protein goals.
Add more greens. Because, why not? Blend spinach into the pesto for an ultra-vibrant green sauce that’s full of iron and other essential nutrients. Alternatively, arugula (rocket) would add a peppery bite.
Use lemon juice and zest instead of balsamic. Both options taste different; balsamic is deeper and more complex, while lemon brings those gloriously distinctive, bright, citrusy notes.

🧂 How to Make Courgette Pesto Pasta (Step-by-Step Photos)

Here’s the major difference between this recipe and others on the web: I don’t oven-bake my courgettes.

I’ve always hated turning on the oven unnecessarily. It’s expensive, and who wants to be turning on the oven in the peak of summer? Not me!

Pan-frying the courgettes is a massive improvement compared to other recipes, both in speed of cooking, affordability, and taste.

But really, the whole recipe is very easy. Boil some pasta, fry some courgettes, blend the pesto — and that’s about it! Let’s see the step-by-step photos:

One: Boil the pasta in salty water until al dente, or according to package directions.

Two: Heat olive oil in a large pan and gently begin to sauté courgette slices.

Three: Cook until the courgettes are just beginning to soften and char.

Chilli flakes and balsamic added to pan.

Four: Season with chilli flakes and balsamic vinegar. Stir, lightly cook, then turn off.

Pine nuts and garlic in a food processor.

Five: Add pine nuts and garlic to a food processor, and pulse.

Six: Add the fresh basil leaves and pulse again, briefly.

Seven: Add half of the sautéed courgettes to the food processor along with olive oil.

Eight: Pulse to blend the courgettes into the sauce, making a creamy dressing. Grate in the hard cheese, and mix.

Courgette, trofie pasta, and courgette pesto in a pan.

Nine: Add the cooked pasta and courgette pesto sauce to the cold pan with the remaining half of the courgettes.

Courgette pesto pasta in a pan, mixed together.

Ten: Mix the pasta well. Add a splash of reserved pasta water if needed to loosen.

Remember, the complete recipe (with ingredient quantities and instructions) can be found at the bottom of this page. You can also print the recipe, save the recipe, adjust the servings, and much more from there!

💡 Top Tips

Salt your pasta water. I say it for every pasta recipe — salting your pasta water adds so much flavour to the dish. Typically, your pasta water should taste “as salty as the sea!”.

Be careful not to overcrowd your pan when you cook the courgettes. As courgettes are particularly watery and can absorb cooking oil, they can easily turn soggy. Although you’ll be making pesto with half the courgettes, you want the remaining slices to keep a little bite and char slightly. If you don’t have a large enough pan to comfortably fit the vegetables, cook in two batches.

Taste and adjust. Good chefs always taste food as they go — and that advice goes for home chefs, too! Ingredients like courgettes, basil, olive oil, and garlic all vary in flavour (some courgettes can be more bitter, for instance, or garlic can be spicier). If needed, add a little more balsamic (or lemon), chilli flakes, or even pesto to suit your palette.

Courgette pesto pasta on a plate, with a white background.

📦 Storage Notes

Leftovers keep well for up to three days in an airtight container in the fridge.

Because the flavours of fresh basil loose its “oomph” when overheated, courgette pesto pasta tastes best cold and served as pasta salad, rather than reheating the dish.

If you do choose to reheat (You rebel, you!), add the pasta to a saucepan with a splash of water to loosen up the sauce, and gently heat.

The Italian meal doesn’t freeze well, unfortunately. But, the good news is, it’s so fast and easy to cook up that you don’t need to freeze extras!

🥗 Serving Suggestions

Courgette pesto pasta works fantastically well at a picnic, easy lunch, or as part of a large three course dinner.

If you want to serve it with sides, it works beautifully with a crisp green salad, garlic bread or a slice of crusty ciabatta to mop up any leftover sauce (or breadsticks), garlic butter fried mushrooms, and a cold glass of lemonade, soda, or peach mocktails.

Whether you’re eating it warm straight from the pan or packing it in a lunchbox, this courgette pesto pasta is a low-effort, high-reward kind of meal that’s a serious hit … every single time.

Now, let’s get to the full recipe. You’re just a little scroll away from forkfuls of herby, rich, creamy pesto-coated pasta!

If you tried this courgette pesto pasta— or any other recipe on my website — please leave a 🌟 star rating and let me know your thoughts in the ✍️ comments at the bottom of the page. Thanks for being a part of my community!