Easy Pasta Salad with Caesar and Italian Dressing

This easy pasta salad is anything but boring! Made with rotini or fusilli pasta, juicy tomatoes, cucumber, black olives, ham, turkey and feta cheese, it's packed with different textures and plenty of delicious additions. The secret is combining two dressings: creamy Caesar dressing and tangy Italian dressing for the perfect balance.

About This Easy Pasta Salad

Pasta, tomatoes, olives, feta, ham and turkey and a mix of two dressings make this a fantastic pasta salad to bring to a pot luck or barbecue. With lots of texture and flavour, I promise that this isn't a boring pasta salad! And if you're proteinmaxxing, this has more protein than a regular pasta salad.

Confession: I am not a big pasta salad fan. Pasta yes, but not really pasta salad (there's only two other pasta salad recipes on my blog, a coronation pasta salad which is Mr NQN's favourite ever salad and a creamy pasta salad). But I made this the way I like it, with lots of additions and flavours rather than a lot of pasta. This way it's colourful, delicious and nutritious with lots of vegetables, protein and cheese.

Video How To Make An Easy Pasta Salad

Ingredients For Easy Pasta Salad

Pasta - Dried pasta in shapes like rotini, fusilli or shells to trap dressings and sauces. Short spiral pastas are great as are short tube pastas like penne or rigatoni.

Caesar dressing - Make a homemade version (it takes 3 minutes!) or use your favourite pre-made one. You can also try my vegan Caesar dressing.

Italian dressing - This is a sharp vinegar and oil based dressing with herbs and garlic. Great to combine with Caesar to create a creamy, tangy sauce.

Tomatoes - I love these tiny little tomatoes because they add a nice pop of liquid in every bite but you can use halved cherry tomatoes or diced tomatoes.

Cucumber - I prefer Lebanese cucumbers as they have a thinner skin and are great for salads. Cut into small chunks as shown.

Olives- We use pitted black olives but green olives can also work. Make sure that they are pitted so that people don't accidentally break their teeth and the pits are also choking hazard when served in a salad.

Ham - Thick cut ham sliced off the bone or ham steaks. Adds a lightly smoky flavour.

Turkey breast - Thick cut turkey breast from the deli. Can also sub with chicken breast.

Cheese cubes - I love using feta cheese as it is salty but you can also use a sharp cheddar cheese. Chop into small cubes.

Italian herbs - This premade herb mix contains garlic, tomato, basil, onion, oregano, parsley and marjoram and is found in the spice aisle.

Easy Pasta Salad Recipe

An Original Recipe by Lorraine Elliott

Recipe Overview

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Cooking time: 8 minutes (concurrently)

Serves: 4-6

Ingredients Needed

For Pasta Salad

• 250g/8.8oz dried rotini or fusilli pasta
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 100ml/3.5oz Caesar dressing
• 60ml/2oz Italian dressing
• 250g/8.8oz tiny tomatoes or diced tomatoes or halved cherry tomatoes
• 1 Lebanese cucumber, diced, around 180g/6oz
• 100g/3.5oz pitted black olives
• 100g/3.5oz diced ham
• 100g/3.5oz diced turkey breast
• 120g/4oz feta or sharp cheddar cheese, small cubes
• 2 teaspoons Italian herbs
• Salt and pepper for seasoning

Homemade Italian Dressing (makes around 75ml/2.6oz)

• 50ml/1.7oz extra virgin olive oil
• 25ml/0.8oz red or white wine vinegar
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 small garlic clove, crushed
• 1/2 teaspoon oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon dried Italian herb mix
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper

Step-By-Step Instructions

Step 1 PASTA- Add salt (2 teaspoons) and pasta (250g/8.8oz) to a large pot of boiling water and boil the pasta until al dente (not too soft). Drain and rinse under cold water.

Step 2 DRESSING - While the pasta is cooking, chop and prep the rest of the ingredients and make the Italian dressing and Caesar dressings. To make Italian dressing, add the olive oil (50ml/1.7oz), vinegar (25ml/0.8oz), sugar (1 teaspoon), garlic (1 small clove), oregano (1/2 teaspoon), herb mix (1/2 teaspoon), salt (3/4 teaspoon) and pepper (1/2 teaspoon) to a jar and shake to emulsify. Taste for seasoning.

Step 3 MIX- In a bowl whisk the Caesar dressing (100ml/3.5oz) with the Italian dressing (60ml/2oz) and then toss with the cooled pasta, tomatoes (250g/8.8oz), cucumber (1 Lebanese cucumber, around 180g/6oz), olives (100g/3.5oz), ham (100g/3.5oz), turkey (100g/3.5oz) and feta (120g/4oz). Mix in Italian herbs (2 teaspoons) and season well with salt and pepper to taste.

Substitution notes:

French vinaigrette dressing also works well in place of Italian dressing.

Personal Note

I mentioned that I don't often make pasta salad because while Mr NQN likes it, I don't eat it that often. But I try and make it every now and then because he loves it so much. "I made pasta salad!" I told him when I made this. "Hang on, what?" he asked, surprised, as I'm not normally excited about pasta salad but I really loved this one.

I had an incident recently where I was misheard. I don't know about you but I use voice dictation a lot on my phone. Except iphone dictation is terrible and sometimes I have to speak in an American accent to be understood.

One day I received an email from a hotel I was working with to become an ad partner for my content. Sometimes you can license your content to hotels or restaurants to run ads and this is a nice little earner. So I asked my contact to ask the hotel to contact me to do that. Except dictation changed it to ask if they wanted to be my "Adult partner" instead of "Ad partner"!

So naturally my contact emailed the hotel enquiring about them being my adult partner!

I saw the email and started laughing. At first I thought it was my contact but then realised that it was me and that terrible dictation!

So tell me Dear Reader, have you ever had any embarrassing dictation errors? Do you like pasta salad?