Healthy Rainbow Pasta Salad

I’ve missed you guys! I’ve got some ‘splaining to do. Where have I been since my last post?! It’s been a whirlwind of a week for me y’all.

First off, how gorgeous and bright is this Healthy Rainbow Pasta Salad?! I thought it was the P E R F E C T way to celebrate that it’s officially SUMMER for me over here. That’s right, I managed to finish my thesis, defend it AND finish my final five exams of my Master’s this semester. I did my LAST EXAM EVER yesterday and I honestly can’t believe it’s all done!!!! There was lots of celebrating last night!

You see friends, I had big plans to share another recipe with you last week between my birthday and my final two exams but I had a VERY unexpected and surprise visitor on my birthday. Remember how I was planning on a relaxing night out with J at a local vegan restaurant?!

Well guess who showed up at my doorstep in Belgium with J when he came home from work?

MY BROTHER!!

He was honestly the last person I expected to see. I have never ever ever experienced such shock in my entire life. I was pinching him and me (literally, lol!) because I honestly could not believe he was in front of me! After about 30 seconds of shock and screaming I broke down and cried such tears of joy. I have never cried tears of joy before but now I can honestly say what it feels like to feel SO much emotion all at once. (That’s me hugging J’s mom in the top middle picture, you can see my brother sneaking behind me to surprise me in the back!).

It was honestly the BEST birthday present ever spending it with my brother, J and J’s awesome family. I hadn’t seen my brother since my trip home to Toronto over Christmas and I can’t remember the last birthday I spent with family. Sooo, as you can imagine, we dropped everything that weekend and showed my brother Belgium! We had so much fun drinking beer, touring the sites here, bbqing and just enjoying each other’s company.

BUT, I still had TWO exams last week (and a paper, ha!) to finish so kept myself off social media and my blog as much as I could and crammed to get everything done. And now I can say that after two years of writing, stress, learning and more I have closed another chapter in my life! I’m very excited to see what the next will hold 🙂

So let’s celebrate with a bright, healthy and veggie-packed RAINBOW Pasta Salad, shall we? This Vegan Rainbow Pasta Salad is a healthy and oil free take on one of my favorite Summer salads growing up.

I used to l o v e getting a similar pasta salad to this Healthy Rainbow Pasta Salad at the grocery store but always found it was made with wayyyyy to much oil and well, not very salad like to say the least, lol. This Healthy Rainbow Pasta Salad uses my trusty starchy pasta water in the dressing to give it a similar, creamy mouth-feel that oil gives to pasta without needing to use all that oil! 😉 This light and filling Rainbow Pasta Salad is sure to be a family favorite all Summer long.

Healthy Rainbow Pasta Salad

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★★★★★

5 from 1 reviews

• Author: Ceara
• Total Time: 30 mins
• Yield: 10 servings (side) 1x

Print Recipe

Description

A vibrant, light and veggie-packed Rainbow Pasta Salad with a tangy homemade dressing. A healthy take on the classic pasta salad we all know and love – the perfect Summer side!

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Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

• 500 grams/17.6 oz multicolored rotini (or pasta of choice)
• 1 1/2 cups red onion
• 1 cup celery
• 2 cups tomatoes
• 3 bell peppers (1 red, 1 yellow, 1 green)
• 3/4 cup radishes
• 1/2 cup black olives

Dressing

• 1/4 cup sunflower seeds
• 1 clove garlic
• 2 tsp herbes de provence
• 1/2 cup red wine vinegar or regular white vinegar
• 1/3 cup starchy pasta water
• 1/4 cup coconut sugar or cane sugar
• 3/4 tsp sea salt
• black pepper to taste

Garnish

• Fresh Basil

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Instructions

1. Cook the pasta according to the directions on the box. While the pasta is cooking, chop and prepare all your vegetables (see photo for size).
2. Drain the pasta and reserve 1/3 cup of the starchy pasta water for the dressing. Rinse the pasta under cold water to cool it down.
3. Dressing: Add all the ingredients (sunflower seeds through to black black pepper) to a blender and blend until creamy. Taste test and add additional sea salt or black pepper to taste. Note: I don’t pre-soak my sunflower seeds and use an immersion blender to blend the dressing (a high speed blender will work fine as well). Feel free to pre-soak your sunflower seeds if you don’t have a strong blender.
4. Add the cool pasta and chopped vegetables to a large bowl and pour the dressing on top. Toss until everything is evenly coated with the dressing. Garnish with fresh basil. Pasta salad tastes even better the next day once the flavors have marinated. Serve cold.

Notes

1) Use gluten-free pasta if necessary. Make sure your multi-colored pasta is vegan. Some multicolored pastas are died using animal ingredients.

• Prep Time: 20 mins
• Cook Time: 10 mins
• Category: Main
• Cuisine: American

And and I LOVE hearing your feedback and seeing your delicious #CearasKitchen creations 😀 Share your photos with me on Instagram @CearasKitchen (and remember to tag #CearasKitchen so I don’t miss it!) or share it on my Ceara’s Kitchen Facebook page. Have a beautiful weekend everyone!