This easy Pizza Pasta Salad is full of different pizza toppings. It is the perfect salad for after a busy day or for summer picnics.
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Most days I let my husband come up with our dinner menu…he also usually makes dinner too. He makes a mean homemade pizza dough that we love for weekend pizza nights! He definitely completes me! Dinner is all him, and dessert is definitely all me.
He is more of a salty snack kind of a guy. Not good for me because he doesn’t eat very much of the sugar that comes from a busy day of baking.
He also has a steel will when it comes to snacking. I must admit that I am kind of jealous of that will power because things like these Nutella no bake cookies just have to smile and wink at me, and I am all over it.
This week I decided to surprise my kids and husband and make some pizza pasta salad for dinner. They were definitely surprised. Here is the best part about this dinner…I made it the night before. Gotta love getting home from school and practices and having dinner completely done.
Two of our kids are in sports and have practice right after school. So if we don’t talk about what we are having for dinner that week, it is going to be fast food or pizza take out every night.
I have to admit the kids did have McDonald’s last week after practice because I just didn’t plan ahead very well. Hey, we had free monopoly tickets that needed used up.
Back to the pizza pasta salad. This is actually really easy, and it is totally customizable. I put everything that my kids like on pizza in with the pasta.
Now only one person in our family actually likes black olives, but I really liked the little bit of extra color it added to the salad. There wasn’t any complaining about it either, so I think they were ok with it. But it is a good thing I didn’t add mushrooms…that would have been the end of the world.
I used a bottle of Kraft Balsamic Parmesan Asiago dressing, but you could use any Italian salad dressing. Go with what you like or what you have in your refrigerator.
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Pizza Pasta Salad
Ingredients
- 16 ounces bow tie pasta
- 2 cups cherry tomato halves
- 8 ounces mozzarella cheese, cubed
- 5 ounces pepperoni minis
- 1 cup chopped green pepper
- 1/2 cup diced black olives
- 1/2 cup diced red onion
- 1 cup salad dressing*
- salt and pepper
- parmesan cheese
Instructions
- Boil the noodles and cool according to the package directions.
- Place everything in a large bowl and stir. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Refrigerate until ready to serve. Sprinkle with parmesan cheese right before serving, if desired.
Notes
*You can use any Italian style dressing. We like the sundried tomato or a balsamic parmesan asiago. Both are great.
More delicious salad recipes that would be great for summer picnics:
- Cowboy Pasta Salad from Belly Full
- Broccoli Cranberry Salad from Spend with Pennies
- Italian Chopped Salad from Chelsea’s Messy Apron
[…] Pizza Pasta Salad […]