The Best Easy Italian Pasta Salad

Meet your new summer bestie:

A stupidly easy Italian pasta salad with rotini, juicy tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, red onion, salami, olives, herbs, and a drench of quick homemade Italian dressing.

If you want to know what I’ve eaten for 4 of my last 5 meals, it’s THIS SUMMER ESSENTIAL. We are kind of having a moment here.

In my mind, a nice classic pasta salad serves one of two scenarios:

Attending a picnic, potluck, or other end-of-summer-everyone-bring-something type party;
Addressing the leftover meat, cheese, and vegetables in my fridge and making them into a meal that I pretty much want to eat 24/7.

This pasta salad will do both for ya.

How Do You Make Pasta Salad?

Do you have two and a half seconds? Cool.

You will need:

Just… some stuff.

It’s very flexible. These are my favorites:

Good, spicy salami. Yummy cheeses. Tomatoes or some other friendly non-threatening vegetable. Greens of some sort – even if it’s just fresh parsley. Olives and red onions and pepperoncini.

Also, we need pasta with good solid texture and shape to absorb all the sauce. I like rotini. (Also, DeLallo! It’s our favorite. The semi-rough texture is unrivaled for sauce-soakage. I get mine at Target or Cub Foods.)

What About A Pasta Salad Dressing?

Thank you for asking. This is important.

We need a tangy Italian dressing.

Homemade, in a blender or food processor, so it takes approximately 60 seconds. You made that Italian dressing, you pasta salad boss, you. ♡

Italian dressing for pasta salad in jar.

Final step:

Toss together, taste and adjust, and exercise every self-control muscle in your body so as not to eat the whole thing before everyone comes over.

May I offer one last tidbit of advice? You do not need to wait to be invited to a picnic or potluck to get some pasta salad magic in your life.

This is a weeknight’s dream meal.

Stop at the store on the way home and pick up some good salami and cheese, some olives, and a few fresh herbs. Cook up some pasta, toss it all together, and voila. Cold pasta salad + a glass of rose for dinner, and colder pasta salad as leftovers for lunch all week.

I will be over in a flash.

Check out our video for how to make Pasta Salad:

The Best Easy Italian Pasta Salad

Author: Pinch of Yum
Prep Time: 30 mins
Cook Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 30 mins
Yield: 10+ – this yields more than 15 cups 1x

Description

Super easy Italian Pasta Salad – with pasta, tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, spicy salami, pepperoncini, olives, and easy Italian dressing. DANGEROUSLY GOOD.

Scale

Ingredients

Pasta Salad Essentials:

1 pound uncooked pasta – I like rotini!
3 cups cherry tomatoes, cut in half
8 ounces fresh mozzarella cheese balls, cut in half
1 lb. salami or summer sausage, cut into cubes
3/4 cup kalamata olives, sliced
3/4 cup pepperoncini (optional, but do it)
1/2 cup sliced red onion
1/2 cup fresh parsley, chopped

Italian Pasta Salad Dressing:

1 1/2 cups olive oil
1/4 cup white vinegar (white vinegar or red wine vinegar work)
1/4 cup water
2 tablespoons coarse sea salt (yes, tablespoons – see notes!)
2 cloves garlic (or 1 teaspoon garlic powder)
1 tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoons each dry oregano and dry basil
black pepper to taste
fresh herbs if you want! sometimes I add fresh parsley, basil, or chives.

Instructions

Cook pasta according to package directions, in salted water for more flavor. Allow to cool slightly and toss with a little oil to prevent sticking.
Blend up the dressing, or shake together in a jar.
Toss all ingredients together! I like to use about three-fourths of the dressing, and then I save the rest of the dressing to add to my leftovers.
Keep in the fridge for 2-3 days. I think it actually tastes best the day AFTER you make it.

Notes

Salt FYI: Please note that the amount written is for COARSE sea salt. If you are using fine table salt, start with 2 teaspoons and add more to taste. The dressing itself will be very salty. Like, too salty for a normal salad. But in this recipe, that’s what we want! That dressing is going to get tossed with an entire pound of plain pasta, as well as a whole lot of fresh unseasoned vegetables, and it will taste delicious once it’s all tossed up.

Customizing Your Pasta Salad: By all means, customize this salad – that’s what it does best! Try adding blanched green beans, fresh spinach, artichokes, red or yellow peppers, chickpeas, etc. for a more veg-forward version. Or different types of cheese (feta? parmesan?), or different shapes of pasta (penne? fusili? maybe even some tortellini?)… the possibilities are endless. I love this salad as-is but I also love its flexibility!

Category: Side
Method: Mix
Cuisine: Italian