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.
Ingredients Used For Greek Pasta Salad
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.
Salt The Water
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.
Cook Pasta To Al Dente
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.
Secret Ingredient For Extra Flavor
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.
More Pasta Salad Recipes
- Curry Chicken Pasta Salad
- Tzatziki Pasta Salad
- Shrimp and Dill Pasta Salad
- Chipotle Chicken Pasta Salad
- Texas Caviar Pasta Salad
- Jalapeno Poepper Pasta Salad
Greek Pasta Salad Recipe
Equipment
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.
Nutrition
Want to Save This Recipe?
Originally posted June 19, 2014.
Pingback: Greek Pasta Salad Recipe – Spicy Southern Kitchen » Greek Recipes
This pasta salad is so bright and summery, Christin! I can whip this up and bring it to work for lunch all week long! 😀
Great Minds!! Don’t you just love when your favorite lettuce lead salads translate well to pasta salads! Perfect for this time of year! Hope you’re staying cool!
I’m always looking for salad that I can take to a get-together and I love a pasta salad that doesn’t require mayo. Nothing worse than a salad with mayo sitting out. I’m always worried about getting ill. So, in my book this salad is perfect! Pinning
You’re right about so many pasta salads being dry and flavorless. This looks like it’s bursting with flavor from all those delicious veggies right down to the dressing! Pinning! 🙂
I am a big fan of Greek salads and love the sound of this pasta version! It looks amazing and perfect for summer 🙂
Oh my gosh – I just posted a Greek Pasta Salad today! I love your version – the dill and the sun-dried tomatoes sound delicious!
Thank you Cate! I can’t wait to check out your recipe!
Greek salad is my favorite – I love this spin on pasta salad! Perfect dish for all those summer BBQ get togethers!
Love this! I made some gorgeous vegan feta the other day that would be perfect to eat with this… Pinning 🙂
This pasta salad looks like perfection!
Oh, this one is perfect! Tasty, refreshing and satisfying!
ela h.
It absolutely sucks when pasta salad tastes bland and oily ugh! But your version looks super delicious and flavorsome – gotta love that vinagreitte and all the flavors going on!
Mmm.. filling and delicious salad!
Gorgeous salad…not to mention delicious it must be…
I love Greek flavors!! Great for 4th of July side dish!
You’re totally making me want to have a picnic just so I can serve this. Looks perfect!
Have a great day Christin!
I love this salad! Greek food is one of my favorites, and this pasta salad looks so so fresh and tasty Your photos are fabulous by the way. —I love the lighting! 🙂 Pinned.
And I love your Greek Avocado Pasta Salad and BLT Pasta Salad with Ranch. Just pinned them both!
Perfect Summer Salad… Delicious. . 🙂
Thank you Arpita 🙂
I loooove pasta salad! I could eat Feta by the handful! Your photos are beautiful!
Thank you Annie. I could eat feta by the handful too! Love the saltiness.
Pasta salad is such a great dish for hot summer days!
It sure is Mary Frances 🙂