Easy Cold Pasta Salad Recipe

We created this easy cold pasta salad recipe years ago when we were looking for a hearty, satisfying meal when it was hot out. We love pasta but not hot pasta during hot weather. The simplest way to satisfy that pasta craving was creating a cold pasta salad.

Easy Cold Pasta Salad Recipe

Truthfully, we usually cook more pasta than we need for a single meal, coat it lightly in olive oil after it is drained and then keep it, cold, in a reusable container in the refrigerator. That way, whenever we want pasta — hot or cold — it’s there for us.

Also, over the years, we’ve tried all different kinds of pasta for these cold salads. We’ve used spaghetti, rigatoni, and penne, but our favorite is spiral pasta. So, a rotini or a fusilli. And we love the tri-color versus the single color because it just makes the base pasta prettier. Then we add colorful vegetables and not only is it pretty to look at, it’s delicious to eat.

We’ll always add some sort of chunky cheese, too. Lately, we’ve been on a feta kick. So our Italian pasta salad is more like a cold Italian and Greek pasta salad. However, in the past we’ve added cubed cheddar or provolone, or mini mozzarella balls.

Speaking of feta, if you have some leftover, you can use them when making Greek meatballs.

The final touch? Our favorite Italian dressing. You can use any brand you like, but we’re fond of Ken’s Italian Dressing. On the other hand, if you don’t have time to buy salad dressing, you can always try a homemade salad dressing recipe instead.

This recipe is one of the simplest, most straightforward cold pasta salad recipes around. We think once you try it, you’ll keep it on your short list, too, like we do.

Ingredients Overview

Step-by-Step Instructions

If you can boil pasta and chop vegetables, then you can make this pasta salad recipe. Here are the steps we take.

Put water on to boil in a pot large enough to cook the amount of pasta you want for your salad. As I mentioned, we’ll often make extra pasta to have on hand in the refrigerator. So, for us, we use a large pot with enough water for two 16-ounce boxes of pasta to cook easily. Note: Some brands of pasta now package in a 12-ounce box. Be mindful of package sizes so you don’t end up with less pasta than you expected.

Cook the pasta for the duration as directed on the box. Then, drain.

If you’re not serving your pasta salad immediately, you may want to put the drained pasta in a bowl in the refrigerator to cool it down so you don’t end up with a warm pasta salad. I recommend drizzling the plain pasta with olive oil so the pasta doesn’t stick together. Or, if you’ll be making it right away, start with the Italian dressing ingredient. Then after you’ve assembled you can put the salad in the fridge.

When you’re ready to assemble your cold pasta salad, it doesn’t really matter what order you add the cut vegetables. However, with this pasta salad, we were adding beautiful purple onions. So I wanted them to come last as a garnish. Anyway, to get started, I added the cut cucumbers.

Next, I added the grape tomatoes. I love getting the multicolored grape tomatoes from Costco. You can usually get a large container for not a lot of money. And, like I said, they are multicolored, which adds the look of this dish. You can always use cherry tomatoes, too. Also, if you’d like you can slice the grape or cherry tomatoes in half before adding. I was pressed for time when making this cold pasta salad, which I was taking to a party. So I left the tomatoes intact.

Next, came the feta cheese. You can use whichever kind of cut or crumbled cheese you prefer on your pasta salad.

The final addition was the red onions.

Now your cold pasta salad is ready to be served.

Final thoughts

Because I added Ken’s Italian dressing at the beginning, I made sure to toss the salad once we got to the party. This way everything was coated. You can always bring extra salad dressing with you, if you’re going to a party like I did. Also, you can add optional salt and pepper, if you feel like the salad isn’t seasoned enough.