During my search, I was truly happy that we have google. Instead of pooring over cookbooks, I was able to type in asparagus salad and instantly had thousands of recipes vying for my attention. The one that caught my eye was a pasta salad wich I had most of the ingredients for that also used an ingredient I hed never used before. In search of feta cheese, I rode my bike to the grocery store. This is when I discovered that winco only sells one brand of feta cheese. I guess this is lucky since I honestly had no clue how to pick good feta.
After adapting the recipe a bit to fit our tastes, I found my favorite pasta salad dish. This is probably going to be on the menu for all our BBQs this summer. You can find the original recipe here, but I will include my adaptation as well.
Pool Party Pasta Salad
Ingredients
- 1 (16 ounce) package farfalle (bow tie) pasta
- 1 cup broccoli florets (I used fresh, but frozen would work too)
- 8 ounces fresh asparagus spears, trimmed and chopped
- 8 ounces diced cooked chicken breast meat
- 1 (15 ounce) can kidney beans, drained
- 1/2 pint cherry tomatoes, halved
- 4 ounces crumbled feta cheese
- 1 cup Italian salad dressing, or as needed
- salt and pepper to taste
Directions
- Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add pasta, and cook until tender, about 8 minutes. Add broccoli florets and asparagus to the boiling water during the last 5 minutes. Drain, and run under cold water to cool.
- In a large serving bowl, stir together the diced chicken, kidney beans, black olives, green pepper, cherry tomatoes, feta cheese and Italian dressing. Stir in the pasta, broccoli and asparagus. Season with salt and pepper to taste. This salad is best if chilled for a couple of hours before serving. You may want to add a little more italian dressing right before serving. It tends to dry out in the fridge.
