A super flavorful and bright pasta salad tossed with all the classic ingredients of a Greek Salad is a great change up from a more traditional pasta salad and will feed a crowd at your next cookout.
Feta cheese, kalamata olives, sun-dried tomatoes, grape tomatoes, cucumber, red onion, and fresh dill give the salad plenty of flavor and saltiness. You could also add some peperoncini and diced pepperoni would be delicious too.
Pasta salad is theoretically such an easy dish to make, but so many turn out oily, dry, or flavorless.
Cook the pasta in lots of water, 1 gallon, and a good 1-2 tablespoons of salt to the water. Salting the water well will go a long way to preventing bland pasta salad.
Only cook the pasta until al dente. Take a full minute or two off of the cooking time on the box. You still want some chew in the pasta otherwise it will become soggy in the pasta salad.
Give the pasta a quick rinse with some warm water, drain and then immediately toss in a large bowl with ½ of the vinaigrette. Put the bowl in the refrigerator and let the noodles chill and soak up the flavor of the dressing. Meanwhile get all the other ingredients ready and mix them into the salad once they are ready to go.
I don’t add the remaining vinaigrette until right before serving to ensure the noodles are not dry.
I like to add some of the oil that the sun-dried tomatoes come packed in to the vinaigrette. It’s delicious oil so you might as well make use of it. Chicken breasts taste wonderful sautéed in it.
Greek Pasta Salad Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 pound fusilli pasta or pasta shape of your choosing
- 1-2 tablespoons salt
- 1/3 cup red wine vinegar
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- ½ teaspoon dried oregano
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon ground black pepper
- ½ cup olive oil
- 1 tablespoon oil from sun-dried tomatoes, optional
- ½ red onion, finely diced
- 1 pint cherry or grape tomatoes
- ¾ cup kalamata olives
- ½ large cucumber, diced
- 2 tablespoons chopped sun-dried tomatoes packed in oil
- 1 cup crumbled feta cheese
- 2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill
- pepperoncini, optional
Instructions
- Bring 1 gallon of water to boil in a large pot.
- Make vinaigrette while water is coming to a boil. In a medium bowl combine red wine vinegar, lemon juice, garlic powder, sugar, oregano, and salt and pepper. Slowly whisk in olive oil and sun-dried tomato oil.
- When water comes to a boil add 1-2 tablespoons of salt and pasta. Cook until al dented. Drain, rinse in warm water, and drain again.
- Place pasta in a large bowl and toss with ½ of vinaigrette. Chill in refrigerator.
- Once pasta has chilled for about 30 minutes, add remaining ingredients EXCEPT remaining vinaigrette. Chill in refrigerator for at least 1 hour.
- Just before serving, add remaining dressing and toss to coat.
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Are the sun dried tomatoes packed in oil treated with sulfur? I have been looking for sun dried tomatoes not treated with sulfur and couldn’t find them!