Marinated Vegetarian Pasta Salad

Vegetarian Pasta Salad

Who would’ve thought those random veggies you’ve got left in the bottom of your fridge could be transformed into something as incredible as this Vegetarian Pasta Salad?? Forget limp, bland veggies sitting sadly amongst tasteless, soggy pasta. THIS cold pasta salad is the polar opposite of that. It’s vibrant, it’s flavour loaded, it’s JUICY, and will make even green-haters scoff down a weeks’ worth of veggies in one sitting! Marinating the vegetables for just 30 minutes makes all the difference in this pasta salad!

How to make this summer Vegetable Pasta Salad

Cook veggies (BBQ or oven) -> marinade in dressing -> toss through pasta. Yep. That’s it. (OK I might’ve skipped a few steps like chop / oil / salt ‘n pepper the veggies, but you get the gist!)

Vegetables for pasta salad

The beauty of this Vegetarian Pasta Salad recipe is this – there are no rules. You can literally put any roastable/grillable veggie in this – and it’s going to be amazing. This is what happens: pasta cooking water is starchy from the pasta. The starch emulsifies with the oil in the dressing and thickens the pasta cooking water so it’s the consistency of dressing. You have more dressing (with the same amount of flavour in it) so you can reserve some to make the pasta salad nice and juicy when you serve it up the next day….and the next! Oh wait. That was a grand statement that sounded really good but I realised was a bit untrue. I think potato might be a bit odd. While the notion of carb-on-carb is not something that has passed me by over the years (potato pizza, anyone??), I don’t think it will quite work here. But that’s the only exception! 😂 Here’s what I use. Now, I confess these were not just dregs of my fridge – I specifically wanted to use the same veggies I used in the Marinated BBQ Vegetables so I could use the same clips in the video to show that you can either roast OR BBQ the vegetables. 😇 But here’s a photo from another time I made this Vegetarian Pasta Salad using other vegetables (I spy cauliflower and broccoli) and also a mix of leftover pasta I had.

Marinade-Dressing for vegetables (double duty!)

And here’s the marinade / dressing I use for this pasta salad recipe. You get great bang for your buck with this marinade:

I make this a LOT!

I make this Vegetarian Pasta Salad a LOT. This, along with Baked Frittata, is one of my favourite ways to use up leftover vegetables at the end of the week because they can be made with any roast-able vegetables, and it lasts for days and days so you can make it now when your veggies are at the end of their life, but eat it later. Some more Leftover Veg favourites include: Vegetarian Lasagna (double up on veg and skip the ricotta layer), Cheesy Vegetable Pasta and this One Pan Roasted Vegetables and Seasoned Rice.

How to serve it

Serve this Vegetarian Pasta Salad as:

a side dish to anything (well, perhaps anything non-Asian!)a meal in itselfwork lunch!GREAT for potlucks and gatherings – transportable, colourful, and of course super delishserve it at room temp OR slightly warm

And while it is meat free, you could certainly add a hit of protein by adding some shredded chicken! – Nagi x