Pasta Salad

As I mentioned earlier, we have a block party to go to later today. Every year you're assigned to bring something based on your house number. This year we got assigned a salad. I love pasta salad...not macaroni salad (mayo based)-that's different. I'm talking pasta salad with some sort of Italian dressing. That kind of salad. I have no idea where this recipe came from. To be honest I think we were at some party and someone had something similar so I just tried to recreate it and came up with my own thing. I love making this because 1. it's easy and 2. you can use anything and sort of clean out your fridge!

Pasta Salad
1 box pasta (I used 16oz Rotini)
1 celery stalk, sliced into "rings"
3/4 can garbonzo beans
1/2 can large black olives, sliced into rings
2 hard boiled eggs, chopped
12 baby carrots, sliced
mozzarella cheese (I used one stick of string cheese cut into small pieces)
bacon bits (we use Hormel real bacon pieces)
Italian dressing (I used Wegman's traditional Italian)

1. Cook pasta as directed on box. Rinse under cold water and drain.
2. Put pasta and all ingredients into bowl and toss until well mixed.


Easy huh?! Honestly, I don't measure anything-most of this was a guesstimate. Basically I add ingredients one at a time and toss it with the pasta. If it doesn't look like enough, I add more. Same with the dressing-I put some in and toss it and see if it's well coated. You may want to have more out when you serve it because sometimes the pasta soaks it up. I can't wait to have some later!