Vegan Friday: Pasta salad

Pasta salad should be as pretty as it is tasty.

Here’s a good recipe for summer picnics and potlucks. Use Creamette’s quick-cooking three-minute rotini to speed up the stovetop part of the process and keep from heating up the kitchen too much. Make this the night before you plan to serve it to give the flavors time to blend and the dried herbs time to soften.

Pasta Salad

1 1/2 c. rotini
1 cucumber
1 bell pepper (or equivalent; I cut up three different peppers and used parts of each for color)
1 carton cherry tomatoes
1 can black olives
2 tbsp. dried Italian spices
1/2 c. Italian dressing

This is basically a big salad with a handful of pasta thrown in.

Prepare rotini according to package instructions. (Don’t overcook it; mushy pasta is nasty.)

While pasta cooks, stir Italian spices into dressing.

Dice cucumber and pepper. Toss cucumber, pepper, tomatoes and olives with dressing-spice mixture.

Drain cooked pasta, rinse under cold water and toss with vegetable mixture.

Refrigerate overnight to allow flavors to blend. Makes four meal-sized servings or eight side-dish-sized servings.