Easy Peasy Pasta Salad – Supper in One Bowl!

Seriously.  If I have to hear/answer the question “What’s for supper?” one more time this summer… I’m gonna scream!  Unfortunately, it’s only June 4th.  Which means I foresee a lot more answering that question AND screaming in my future.  How about you?

Today’s recipe for Easy Peasy Pasta Salad though, is always a great answer to have on hand.  Especially on those crazy busy, crazy hot summer evenings!

Monday Nights

Oh, friends!  Monday nights in the summer are, quite frankly, bananas.  This particular Monday night is even more so.  Why?  Well, because we just got back from an absolutely amazing vacation (more on that later).  And it’s the first Monday of summer break with all of the kids home.  Add to that our normal Monday night routine of four different swim team practices and one kid who coaches for 3 hours and you get where I’m coming from.

So, when I was menu planning this week, I knew Monday night would need some special consideration.  Whatever I made tonight had to be:

• made ahead
• healthy
• portable
• able to be served cold
• filling

If that sounds like something that intrigues you, if it sounds like something your family would eat up just as much as mine will…

Then let’s do this thing!

Easy Peasy Pasta Salad

Seriously, this is the easiest thing ever.  Can you chop vegetables?  Cool.  Can you boil water for pasta?  Excellent.  Can you eyeball half of a bottle of Italian dressing?  Wonderful.  You’ve got this!  Here goes.

I already had cans of black olives and artichoke heart quarters in my pantry, so I pulled them out and chopped them up.  Next, I grabbed some tiny tomatoes and various bell peppers and gave them a rough chop, too.  I love fresh mozzarella, so I diced up a ball of that and added a whole bag of the teensy pepperonis from Publix.  Don’t like pepperoni?  Try using salami.  Wanna go completely vegetarian?  Leave it out!  Let’s just say this combination of flavors is a suggestion.  Also, I didn’t measure any amounts whatsoever.  Whatever looks good to you is A-OK.

While you’re chopping all that stuff up, boil up 12-16 ounces of pasta.  I used the veggie kind, but plain old macaroni would be great, too.  Once it’s done boiling, strain the water and rinse the pasta under cold water to really stop the cooking process.  You don’t want it to be mushy!

Last, but not least, pour in about half a bottle of your favorite Italian dressing (I like Newman’s Own).  Give it a good stir and then refrigerate it until dinner time.  That’s it!

I made it just after lunch today, so it’ll have a couple hours to marinate together in the fridge until we start our sporadic dinner eating tonight.  This will be great for Coach Adam to take in a to-go container to eat on his break and for the rest of us to pull out and serve up whenever time allows.

I don’t know about you, but this seems to tick off all those requirements I had, yeah?  Easy, healthy, filling, portable, served cold…all of the above!  AND, here’s a real plus, I didn’t have to heat up the kitchen at all!

Enjoy, friends!  Let me know if you’ve got something like this in your summer dinner rotation and what else you like to serve to keep it fresh during the dog days.