Hen Pasta Salad (with Creamy Greek Yogurt Dressing)

This creamy hen pasta salad is totally loaded with goodies: bacon, peppers, broccoli, corn, feta cheese, hen, and tomatoes… all tossed along with a tangy, herby buttermilk Greek yogurt dressing. This huge pasta salad can feed a crowd, and it additionally makes for nice leftovers.

What started a couple of years in the past as a “throw a bunch of leftovers along with some chilly pasta” dinner has turn out to be a summertime staple in my home. Pasta + hen + veggies + bacon + cheese + simple. This hen pasta salad is a profitable mixture for positive. And it all comes along with a tangy home made dressing that’s practically unattainable to go up.

It’s the pasta salad for these of us who like plenty of STUFF of their salads. 😉

Right here’s Why You’ll Love This Hen Pasta Salad:

• Endlessly customizable—add your favourite greens, strive a distinct cheese, or make it vegetarian
• Creamy, tangy dressing made with low-fat buttermilk and Greek yogurt
• Handy make-ahead recipe, similar to my creamy strawberry feta pasta salad
• Makes an enormous batch, good to take to a BBQ or different gathering
• Scrumptious leftovers make for a fast and straightforward lunch or dinner

If it’s a vegetable and you’ve got it available, you must throw it into this pasta salad. Like artichokes, olives, shredded carrots, diced cucumbers, chickpeas, you get the thought! With that in thoughts, right here’s my beginning lineup of elements:

Base Elements in Creamy Hen Pasta Salad

• Pasta: I like fusilloni or rotini finest right here as a result of the corkscrew form captures a lot of the creamy dressing. Use any brief pasta that’s simple to eat (let’s keep away from fettuccini right here!), and has numerous nooks and crannies to carry onto dressing.
• Chopped Cooked Hen: This may be grilled, blackened, poached, rotisserie roasted—no matter you occur to have available. I want grilled or rotisserie.
• Cherry Tomatoes: You’ll love the little juicy pops of taste these give the pasta salad. They’re the most effective components of this kale pesto mozzarella pasta salad, too!
• Broccoli: Chop contemporary broccoli florets into small items—no have to prepare dinner it. Once I don’t have broccoli available, I often sub in cucumbers.
• Cooked Corn: Candy, crisp corn scraped off the cob is the tastiest on this pasta salad, however frozen and thawed or canned corn work too.
• Bell Pepper: Crimson, orange, yellow—take your decide from the pack of peppers. (Say that 5 occasions quick!)
• Feta Cheese: Salty, creamy feta cheese crumbles style so good on this salad, however be happy to swap in a distinct cheese.
• Cooked Bacon: Crisp and crumbled bacon bits add a lot unimaginable taste to each chew.

Whereas the pasta cooks, prep the opposite elements and make the salad dressing.

Buttermilk Herb Greek Yogurt Dressing

Now let’s discuss in regards to the dressing! Although there’s already a lot to like on this pasta salad, the dressing really makes the entire dish come collectively. The base is low-fat/nonfat Greek yogurt and low-fat buttermilk. When you can’t discover buttermilk, you should utilize complete milk and add an additional teaspoon of lemon juice, however you’ll lose some taste. Add a bit of mayonnaise, a drizzle of olive oil, some contemporary herbs, a squeeze of lemon, a splash of vinegar, and a sprinkle of seasonings. It tastes tangy, creamy, and oh-so-much-better than store-bought dressing. It jogs my memory a bit of of the Greek yogurt sauce that pairs so properly with these zucchini fritters.

This recipe makes about 2 cups of dressing. It might appear to be quite a bit, however the pasta soaks up quite a bit because it sits, and there are additionally so many add-ins—this recipe feeds a crowd!

Place the nice and cozy pasta, chopped veggies, and hen in an enormous bowl, and pour many of the dressing on high. Stir to mix and coat every thing with dressing, then add the crumbled feta and bacon and stir once more. That’s it! There’s extra work in chopping all of the greens than really making this dish.

You may take pleasure in it straight away, however I prefer it finest after it sits for a pair hours within the fridge. The flavors develop a bit of extra, turning this into pasta perfection.

Success Tip: Save a Little Dressing for Serving

Save the final little bit (a couple of Tablespoons) of dressing to stir into the pasta salad proper earlier than serving, so it tastes additional creamy and flavorful. I’ve been making this recipe for years, and I simply found this little trick. What a distinction it makes! You see, because the pasta salad sits, it absorbs increasingly more of that scrumptious dressing and may start to clump collectively. Give it a bit of refresher to loosen it up, and so as to add one other sprint of taste.

Success Tip: Maintain the Pasta Heat

Don’t let the cooked and drained pasta cool for too lengthy. Heat pasta mixes simpler, and helps the flavors within the dish *pop.* As a bonus, the nice and cozy pasta begins to melt the feta cheese, so the dish is even creamier. So good.

Print

Hen Pasta Salad (with Creamy Greek Yogurt Dressing)

• 
  Writer: Sally
• 
  Prep Time: Half-hour
• 
  Prepare dinner Time: 10 minutes
• 
  Complete Time: 40 minutes
• 
  Yield: serves 12
• 
  Class: Dinner
• 
  Methodology: Cooking
• 
  Delicacies: American

---

Description

This easy pasta salad has the works! Bacon, crisp peppers, broccoli, feta cheese, hen, and tomatoes lined in a creamy, tangy  buttermilk Greek yogurt dressing. It’s for these of you who just like the “stuff” in pasta salads, greater than the pasta itself! Easy, fast, and makes nice leftovers. For one of the best outcomes, observe my recipe carefully.

---

Buttermilk Herb Greek Yogurt Dressing

Pasta Salad

---

Directions

1. Make the dressing first, so it’s able to go. Whisk the entire dressing elements collectively, and hold at room temperature or cowl and refrigerate till prepared to make use of. Might be made and refrigerated for as much as 2 days earlier than utilizing.
2. Have the hen and your entire greens chopped, measured, and prepared for step 4, since you don’t need the pasta to chill for too lengthy. 
3. Prepare dinner the pasta: Carry a big pot of salted water to a boil. (I often use 1 teaspoon salt.) Add the pasta and prepare dinner till simply previous al dente. See pasta bundle for particular directions. Drain the pasta, and let it cool for simply 3-5 minutes.
4. Pour pasta into a big bowl. Add the hen, tomatoes, broccoli, corn, and pepper. Pour many of the dressing over the pasta salad (reserve about 1/3 cup or 80ml to make use of in step 7) and gently toss to mix.
5. Stir within the feta cheese and bacon. Style. Season with extra salt, pepper, and herbs if desired.
6. You may serve the pasta salad straight away, but it surely tastes even higher for those who cowl and refrigerate it for a minimum of 1 hour and as much as 1 day. If refrigerating for longer than a couple of hours, let it sit on the counter for 20-Half-hour earlier than serving, to assist loosen up the chilly, agency pasta.
7. Everytime you’re able to serve it, stir within the reserved dressing.
8. Cowl leftovers tightly and retailer within the fridge for as much as 1 week.

---

Notes

1. Make Forward Directions: Make the dressing as much as 2 days upfront. See step 1. You may make your complete pasta salad as much as 1 day upfront. See steps 6 and seven.
2. Particular Instruments (affiliate hyperlinks): Glass Mixing Bowls | Whisk
3. Buttermilk: Buttermilk is essential for taste. When you don’t have any, use complete milk or low fats milk and add 1 additional teaspoon of lemon juice to the dressing. Nondairy milk works in a pinch, however the taste is missing. Add the additional teaspoon of lemon juice if utilizing nondairy, and add extra herbs to style.
4. Mayonnaise: Don’t pass over the mayonnaise! You may’t style it that a lot, but it surely does add a bit of taste. When you resolve to exchange it with extra yogurt, the dressing tastes additional tangy.
5. Totally different add-ins: Be at liberty to swap out any of the greens for different favorites resembling cucumber, artichokes, olives, shredded carrots, or chickpeas.
6. Can I pass over the hen? Sure, you possibly can skip the hen and add extra greens, or change with cooked chopped ham or sausage.
7. Up to date model: I initially revealed this recipe in 2014! It wanted a bit of makeover, because the dressing lacked taste. To repair it, I doubled the mayonnaise, lemon juice, and vinegar, added some sugar to stability out the flavour, and added dill. It’s extraordinary now, and yields a bit extra so the pasta salad is much more flavorful.

Diet

• Serving Measurement: 1 serving
• Energy: 330
• Sugar: 5.3 g
• Sodium: 411.2 mg
• Fats: 14.8 g
• Carbohydrates: 35.3 g
• Protein: 14 g
• Ldl cholesterol: 31.2 mg

Key phrases: hen pasta salad