What happens when you take a classic tuna salad and add toss in some pasta, you get a delicious pasta salad loaded with veggies and protein. Yay.
Pasta Nicoise
Servings
6 Servings
Ingredients
- 1 12-ounce box rotini, cooked according to package directions
- ½ 15-ounce can hearts of palm, drained and sliced
- 1 15-ounce can green beans, drained
- 1 15-ounce can pitted black olives, drained
- 1 6-ounce can white albacore tuna in water, drained
- 12 grape tomatoes halved
- 2 tablespoons capers
- ¼ cup baby spinach leaves
- ⅓ cup olive oil
- ⅓ cup mayonnaise
- ⅓ cup plain low-fat yogurt
- 2 cloves garlic peeled
- 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
- 2 tablespoons fresh parsley minced
- 2 tablespoons fresh dill minced
- 1 teaspoon dried basil
- ½ teaspoon salt
- Imitation bacon bits for garnish (optional)
Instructions
- In a salad bowl, place pasta, hearts of palm, green beans, olives, tuna, tomatoes, capers and spinach.
- Place all dressing ingredients in blender or food processor, and mix until smooth and creamy.
- Pour over pasta and tuna. Toss to coat evenly.
- Garnish with imitation bacon bits, if desired.
Tips
- You can add variety to this dish by adding ¼ cup anchovy fillets. Or for a sweet touch, add 2 tablespoons of Craisins. If you have loads of time, substitute fresh tuna steaks for canned tuna. Season both sides of the steaks with salt and pepper and broil or sear.
- Contributed by: Quick & Kosher, JAMIE GELLER
Hey Maxine so sorry we confused you – of course we would never use real bacon.
Bacon Bits are usually made from soy and are certified kosher, that is what this is referring to.
Ok thanks, Tamar, we do not get them in South Africa I think!!!!
I know we have different things, you get a lot of fun stuff we don’t get and sometimes when we write these recipes we don’t realize that everyone doesn’t know the same products as us, so we appreciate you asking about it.
Note the optional choice ;Bacon Bits’
not very nice for a kosher website!!!!!!!!!!!!
awesome! thanks so much for sharing your adjustments!
Delicious and easy! A family favorite. I leave out the yogurt and don’t adjust the mayo and olive oil, and find the dressing just right as well as pareve.
SarahEats – Nicoise Salad (and variations such as Pasta Nicoise etc…) is a specialty of the Cote D’Azur region of France, originating in and named for the city of Nice. Very common is nicoise dishes is the use of black olives, tomatoes, potatoes, beans and vinaigrette dressing. So the Pasta Nicoise recipe here is obviously a take on the traditional.
Hey Penina – you can use a total of 1/2 cup olive oil and 1/2 cup mayo in place of the (1/3 each of olive oil, mayo and yogurt) – feel free to use low fat mayo if you want. You may have to adjust some of the seasoning a bit so just give it a taste and see if you need more lemon juice or garlic , even a dash of Worcestershire sauce (or even Tabasco) would be nice.
If you want to make the dressing non-dairy – what is a good substitute for the yogurt?
Thanks – btw, what is Nicoise?
Should be good for at least 2 days – keep in mind that it will taste better if you let it come to room temperature before enjoying and even better if you keep the dressing separate and mix in just before eating bc otherwise it will significantly dry out over the pasta if it’s in the fridge for too long. Enjoy!
How long can this stay in the refrigerator? It’s perfect to take to work for lunch!